Hiding in the Rye
by WitchGirl
Summary: In his efforts to get closer to Nick, Greg uncovers a violent secret about Nick's past, and suffers the consequences for it. Can Greg convince Nick that what he feels is not a sin? Nick/Greg slash. Rated for language and violence.
1. All Hyde and No Jekyll

Hiding in the Rye

**Summary:** In his efforts to get closer to Nick, Greg uncovers a violent secret about Nick's past, and suffers the consequences for it. Can Greg convince Nick that what he feels is not a sin? Nick/Greg slash.

_**Author's Note:**_ This is a trilogy. Rather than post all three one-shots separately, I am posting them all here. They are all quite different from each other, but all of them aid in the progression of the story. Enjoy part one, told through Greg's point of view. This will not be updated daily, but will definitely be updated weekly at the latest, as there are only three updates. It may be updated before the week is over, so keep an eye out. A shout-out to LaughableBlackStorm for the beta.

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**Part One: All Hyde and No Jekyll**

One could argue that there were many ways in which I wanted to get inside of Nick Stokes, but probably the most important one to me was getting inside his head. Throughout all our years working together, he would often switch attitudes in the middle of a conversation, but it only happened when we were having a serious discussion. Once or twice, it would happen on a case. I tried as best I could to ignore it when I triggered it, because frankly he scared me whenever he got that way. But I never gave up trying to get closer to him. I always figured I was deluding myself thinking that maybe I could convince him to fall for me, when he's been straight his whole damn life. But if delusions were all I had, I'd take them over reality. I could always pretend, so long as I never actually said anything out loud.

"In college…" I began one night on our way out of a bar and onto the strip. It was back when I was still a tech, and he still considered me the comic relief of his life. "Did you ever do anything crazy?"

He cocked a friendly eyebrow at me. "As in… what? Drugs?"

I nodded, but that hadn't been what I meant. "As in drugs," I conceded. "As in… strip poker or a sexual truth or dare or binge drinking…"

"I may or may not have done some marijuana," Nick said carefully.

I rolled my eyes. "Oh please, marijuana isn't a drug."

He laughed. "It is according to the DEA."

"So you smoked pot. Who didn't?" I paused, trying to figure out how to word it so it didn't sound obvious. "But if you did pot, then maybe you experimented with a few other things."

Nick shook his head. "Sorry, Greg, I was unadventurous in college. Why, what did you do?"

_Men_, I thought lightly to myself, but said instead, "A couple things… You know, the average experimenting stuff kids are supposed to do at that age. Alcohol, drugs… sex…"

"I heard you didn't lose your virginity until you were twenty two."

I emitted an exasperated sigh. "Is there anyone Sara _didn't_ relay that information to?"

While technically true, you can do any number of things and still call yourself a virgin. Girls do it all the time. But I didn't tell Nick this.

"So don't pull my leg, Greg, you didn't do jack sexually in college."

He was teasing me, not accusing me. It was playful, not spiteful. "Alright, well, did you?"

He looked up momentarily, a pensive expression on his face as the bright lights cast a neon pink halo around his head. He shrugged. "I don't really know what constitutes as experimenting. I had sex, if that's what you mean." He smirked at me.

He wasn't catching on. And it was bad of me to press the matter, because I could be looking for a black eye, but I needed to know, I needed an answer to fuel my ever growing fascination. I needed something to cling to, even if it was false hope. "Well, I mean… what kind of… people did you have sex with?" I wondered if he would notice my careful omission of the word 'girls.'

He stopped walking and I didn't notice until after I took a few more steps. I turned, and his smile was gone. I knew immediately that I had been too forward

His left eye twitched. "What are you asking me Greg?"

_Shit_, I thought. _Why did I have to ask?_ "Um… were they hot?" I covered quickly. "The girls, I mean, did you sleep with, um… cheerleaders or physics majors or actresses or what?"

He relaxed slightly before shaking his head. "Girls…" he reiterated.

I nodded forcefully, desperate to reassure him. "Girls."

"Why didn't you say girls?"

"What did you assume I meant?"

We stared at each other as the crowd passed by on either side. My eyes were wide, verging on afraid, but also deathly curious. His were sharp, pointed, and far away, and I wasn't sure what he was thinking. I would have given anything to know what he was thinking.

"Just girls," he said quietly. "I have no interest in anything else."

His voice was cold, almost disgusted, and it made my heart plummet into my stomach. It sloshed around for a moment as the acids began to chip away at it, but I didn't want to lose it so easily. Swallowing hard and forcing it back to its proper place in my chest, I tried to gather my courage instead of turning around and running.

"Of course not," I said, my voice unintentionally cracking and I coughed. "I mean, why would you?"

"Exactly," Nick said, nodding. "Why would I, Greg?"

"You wouldn't, that's what I just said!"

I saw his hands clench into fists and watched the monster in him surface behind those swoon-worthy brown eyes. For a moment, I wondered if he would hit me for my suggestion. He moved forward quickly and I instinctively stepped back, but he stopped himself, his foot rooted to the ground as he spoke, his voice a low, steady growl.

"Why would you ask me that, Greg?"

"I didn't ask you anything," I told him. "I was just making conversation. So marijuana, huh? How was that?"

I watched as the beast within him subsided and he relaxed. The smile returned to his features, softening them, and he was the Nick Stokes I knew and loved again. Not the one that terrified me.

"What, you never had it?"

"Well, everyone's trip is different, isn't it?" I replied, putting on my own happy mask and trying to still my desperate heart. "So what was yours like?"

That night on the strip wasn't the only time I saw him change in a matter of seconds because of something I did or said. When I was still new at the whole CSI thing, we were paired on a case together. It struck Nick hard because it involved a little boy found in a dumpster, evidence of sexual assault. I knew that kids' deaths were one of the few things that really bothered Nick, but on this particular case, he took control, and wouldn't take anything I had to say into consideration.

Catherine seemed to notice. She told me to drop it and then had a quiet word with Nick privately. After that, he seemed a little calmer, and he let me talk. I suggested we take a closer look at the father.

"Why?" Nick said suddenly. "It's the nanny that was with him every day, and she's the one who saw him last!"

"Nick, it was penetration," I said slowly, knowing I was treading on thin ice.

"Foreign object," Nick said automatically, as if he had expected my protest.

"But we don't _have_ that object," I told him.

"We could find it," Nick said. "We might have just missed it. We _must _have missed it. It was her, I know it was."

"Would you get away from the nanny? She has an alibi anyway!"

"Yeah, a flimsy one. She says left town that night? No one to corroborate, is there? Convenient that the mother she went to visit has Alzheimer's." Nick seemed obscenely bitter, and his teeth were clenched, and he began to worry me again.

"What's the matter with you?" I asked finally. "Why are you determined to peg this on the nanny, who is female and has an alibi? Most child molesters are male, especially where there's penetration involved—"

"But some _are female_," Nick hissed.

I stared at him a moment as a bead of sweat trickled down his temple. I fought the urge to reach out and wipe it away. "But generally speaking, female molesters leave little evidence. They don't work the same way men do. They're generally softer, more manipulative, better at making the kid think… Nick, are you OK?"

He jumped to his feet and ran a shaking hand through his hair. He closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and calmed down. "Yeah… yeah, I just need some… some coffee or something."

I really hoped that the conclusions I was jumping to were wrong, but I couldn't help but consider them. "Nick…"

"I'm _fine_, Greg!" he snapped. He sighed then shook his head. His next words were in a quiet whisper. "I thought I was over something. I'm clearly not. That's all."

"Do you want to talk about—"

"No."

I watched him, nervously, expecting him to explode or melt down or hit me or do _something_. But he just stood there, staring at the table with the files scattered on it, breathing heavily. A few minutes later, I saw Catherine walk by and she noticed us through the windows. She appeared in the doorway.

"Nicky?" she whispered.

"Yeah?" he returned, but did not look at her.

"I just spoke with Grissom. He has a new case for you. I'm going to take over here."

I looked at Nick again to see his reaction, not knowing what to expect. If I'd been pulled from a case, I might have been a little annoyed. But instead, he just closed his eyes, swallowed, and nodded.

"Yeah," he said, looking up at her. "OK."

He moved past her and out the door and she watched him leave before turning back to me. "OK, Greg. Would you bring me up to speed?"

I blinked, feeling Nick's absence. I tried to shake it off. "Oh yeah, um… right." I sat down at the table again and spread out the files.

I never did figure out what was bothering him, but I did have my suspicions.

And then, I went to visit him at home, on his last day of leave after he was buried six feet underground in a Plexiglas coffin. I knocked on his door. He didn't open it, but I heard the chain slide in the lock and fall against the door. I was shaken, and I needed to reassure myself that he was alive. At the time, I still had the nightmares that when we dug up that coffin it was just in time to see his brains splatter the inside of it.

I pushed the door open and saw Nick sitting on the couch in a pair of black slacks and a white wife beater. There was ample dark stubble on his face and I wondered when the last time he shaved was. This was before he grew his moustache. But this was different than that facial hair disaster. When did grow the moustache, he would keep the hair above his lip neatly trimmed. It would be intentional and he would take care of it. The rough hairs that covered his face now were unkempt and wild. He wasn't even trying to control it.

"What do you want?"

I was caught off guard. The demand was gruff and unwelcoming, but Nick just took a swig of his beer and picked a book up off of the coffee table. He leaned back and opened it, his eyes skimming over the pages. Whether or not he was actually reading, I couldn't be sure.

"I'm worried about you," I said honestly. "I didn't expect you to look this bad."

"How'd you expect me to look?" His eyes rose above the edge of the book and nearly knocked me off my feet.

"Better than this," I admitted. "When's the last time you shaved?"

"Few days ago," he muttered, turning back to his book. "Did you just come here to check on my hygiene?"

"Hygiene is a part of health."

"The doctors say I'm fine."

"Sanity is a part of health too."

"Fuck you." It wasn't an angry utterance, just a bored and jaded remark as his eyes remained on the pages of his book.

I dared to take a step closer. He didn't respond, so I moved closer still. I was much nearer to him now, but he didn't acknowledge that I had moved at all. He simply took another swig of his beer and swung his feet up on the coffee table.

"What are you reading?"

His head didn't move but his eyes rolled up to look at me. He lifted the cover, which read _The Catcher In The Rye_.

I smiled. "Ah. You know, that's the only book I finished in my tenth grade English class. Is it a favorite of yours too?"

Nick didn't reply. It was clear he was trying to make me go away, but I wasn't about to make it so easy. This new Nick, this dark, angry Nick wasn't what I wanted, and I wasn't content to leave him like this. I wanted the happy Nick back, the jovial, joking, sweet, friendly Nick. I needed him. It wasn't so bad when he would periodically turn into Mr. Hyde, because Jekyll would always return again soon enough. But this… this was bad. It was as if Hyde had slaughtered Jekyll and now inhabited his carcass.

"Have you read it before?" I probed tentatively. Again, Nick refused to acknowledge me. I bit my lip. "Would you please _talk_ to me, Nick?"

"I have nothing to say," the Texan stated simply as he turned the page of his novel. "Now shut up. Holden is talking to his sister. I love this part."

"What is it, a fucking movie?!" I finally burst out, all the tension and the terror escaping through my voice. "You can put the book down and finish it later!"

"But I _want_ to finish it _now_," Nick said pointedly, but his eyes still refused to look up at me.

I gritted my teeth, a cold sweat beginning to trickle down the side of my face as I tried to tame my fury. "I know you're going through shit right now," I said, as quietly and as slowly as I possibly could. "I get it, I really do. Almost dying, that's gotta be… I don't even know. I mean, there was the lab explosion, but—"

"Do you really think it compares, Greg?" Nick asked icily. "Do you _really_ think that you can even begin to try and sympathize with what I went through because you got blown through a window? I've been thrown through a window too, you know. I fell two stories. Do you remember that?"

"So what is this, the who-had-the- worst-near-death-experience game?" I cried. "I don't want to play that with you, Nick. I know you'll win. You _always_ win. But for once, would you just look at me and realize for a split second that this affects us too? Your friends? Us, who had to watch you on the fucking camera, holding that goddamn gun, and there was no amount of shouting, or crying, or clawing at the screen that could make you stop, that would bring you home?"

To my surprise, Nick began to laugh as he finally closed his book and leaned back into the cushions of the couch, looking at me with mirthless eyes and a dark expression. "It's funny, you talk about how hard it was for you. Listen, Greg, I didn't ask you to come here and deal with my problems. I can do it on my own—"

"You clearly _can't_ because you're fucking angry!" I burst out, although with my volume and language it was the pot calling the kettle black. "I hate it when you're angry, Nick! It scares the hell out of me."

"You shouldn't see me angry," he whispered, and now he sounded almost apologetic. "And I'm sorry, when you do. But that's why I take this time off when I get this way. That's why I want to be alone. So I can sort through it, and so I can go back to work, seeing you guys again, and be positive, be hopeful, be the good, reliable guy that you've come to know." He gestured at the door with his book. "So if you could just…"

I looked at the door for a moment, and seriously considered fleeing. The more I stayed in this frozen apartment, the colder I became, the larger the lump grew in my throat, and the more the fear filled my stomach. I was worried that if I stayed there much longer, I would turn into him, this monster who had taken over my friend.

"I miss you…" I whispered. "Please, Nicky… I want…" Was now the time? "I want my best friend back." Well, it was a start.

His eyes softened then, and for a moment I thought I had succeeded in picking out the pieces of Jekyll in the sea of Hyde. He took a deep breath and stared at the ceiling a moment, as if afraid to look me in the eyes. "I was… raised to believe that men aren't…" He seemed to run out of words, or courage, or both, but either way he shut his mouth and seized his book again, opening it up. "I don't want to talk about it."

But I had seen a glimmer of the man that I loved and I wanted it back. I clutched it and held onto it like the first star in a dark evening, praying that there would be thousands more to come. "You were raised to believe that men don't talk about things?" I probed with a weak smile.

He snorted and turned a page in his book. "No, I… There are so many things that swirl around in my head, Greg, and trust me when I tell you that you do not want to know my issues."

I dared to move closer still, my shins hitting the edge of the coffee table, slowly making my way to the couch where I would be able to sit by him, to breathe him in, maybe brush his thigh… "But I do. I want to know everything about you, Nick."

He looked up at me, his eyes almost accusatory. "Why?"

I shrugged. "I know I'm not your best friend, but you're mine," I confessed. "And wanting to know about your best friend is natural, isn't it?"

He grunted. "I guess."

There was nothing physically stopping me from moving to the couch and sitting by him, and yet some invisible ropes seemed to be holding me back, binding me to the spot. "Why do you like _Catcher in the Rye_ so much?"

"Because I do."

I suppose it was a fair reply. "I don't want to leave you here like this."

"Well then we've come to an impasse," Nick said, trying to stare me down. "Because I don't want you to stay here."

But I refused to back down. Not when I had come so far. "What are you so afraid of?" I whispered. "Why won't you talk to me?"

His gaze faltered, but he regained his confidence quickly enough. "I just don't…" And he wavered again. I could see it in him. He _wanted_ to tell me something, and I wanted to hear it. It was haunting him, like an old dirty habit or some ancient regret pressed between the curling yellow pages of a book he hadn't opened in years. And I wanted to read his story.

"You wish you could catch them."

Nick's brow furrowed at my words and he was obviously torn. "What?"

I smiled and dared to move to the couch now, but I didn't sit. I looked down at him a moment and he looked up at me. For the first time he showed that he was uncomfortable with our close proximity and moved slightly down the couch. Accepting this new distance between us, I sat down at the other end. But I still watched him.

"The children," I explained. "You want to save them from tumbling over the cliff. Just like Holden. You want to catch them."

His mouth was straight and his eyes were stony. "What children?"

The memory of the dead boy he had been convinced the nanny molested and murdered came to mind. It turned out that it _had_ been the father after all, and the nanny and the mother had both been appalled and torn apart. A whole family ruined because of one man's selfish cruelty. If that could ruin a whole family, I wondered what simple thing it had taken to break Nick Stokes.

"I've seen you," I said quietly, "on cases with kids."

"The cliff is a metaphor for growing up, Greg, not dying."

I licked my lips. "What's the difference? The cliff is the end of innocence, and those children that we see have had their innocence stolen from them all the same." I badly needed to ask him who had stolen his innocence, even though I wasn't too sure what I meant by that.

Regardless, he was visibly disturbed by my words. "I think you should leave, Greg."

"So you've said, but I'm not going to," I returned.

He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. "It really would be better for the both of us if you just _left_ right now."

I saw his knuckles whiten as they clenched the book. "I want to know why you're so angry all the time."

He didn't speak, his eyes low on the coffee table. He was trembling so slightly I didn't even notice until I stared at him long enough. His eyes were far away and glossy, a film of liquid coating them, and I knew that now, more than ever, he needed a friend, and I needed to hold him. I sidled over on the couch and he didn't protest. I was sitting right next to him now. I could smell the tangy musk of his sweat, and I wondered when he last showered, but I didn't care because I was near him and he didn't run away from me. My knee knocked against his. He looked up at me, his jaw clenched, his eyes wide.

I wasn't above begging. "Please..." I breathed, desperation in my voice. "Nick..." I tentatively reached out a hand and rested it on his knee. I squeezed it, reassuringly, hoping that this was how friends acted, and that Nick wouldn't read too much into it. I needed him to know that he always came first, above everything. I needed him to know that I wasn't giving up on him, and that I didn't care about the secrets he kept from me. I just wanted him to sincerely laugh again, because I loved that deep, booming guffaw more than any other sound in the world.

My mouth was dry and I swallowed to try and stimulate my saliva glands. Our eyes were locked, and he didn't waver. I saw a strange hunger in his eyes as he watched me then. His knees turned towards me and he dropped the book, letting it fall to the floor with a clatter. We teetered on the jagged edge momentarily, each of us knowing that something was bound to happen and we were both destined to fall, but into what, I don't think either of us was very sure. Dozens of scenarios raced through my mind. I expected him to break down, to embrace me, to let me comfort him. I expected anything, other than what happened next.

Slowly, probingly, his hand reached out and lightly rubbed my upper arm. The sensation was so intense I had to fight to suppress a gasp of pleasurable surprise. I could feel the hairs on my arm stand on end at the electricity of his touch. Eventually, his hand moved over the sleeve of my T-shirt and up onto my shoulder, his finger curling around my neck, his eyes curious, lost and dark, and I wished I could read him better, and I wondered if I had fallen asleep because I could have sworn his lower lip jutted out and he leaned forward. If this was a dream, I prayed I wouldn't wake up soon. His hand was rubbing the back of my neck and I closed my eyes in anticipation of the moment that would never come.

I felt the burning claws on my neck first as his hand suddenly clenched, his nails digging into my skin and my eyes snapped open in time to see Nick's other hand swipe me, catching me in the jaw and sending my world reeling as I tumbled off the couch and into the coffee table, bruising my ribs as the side of it knocked into me. The coffee table moved and I was on the floor, Nick still on the couch looking livid, breathing heavily, and the next thing I knew, he had jumped on me and I brought my hands up instinctively to cover my face, terror engulfing me, almost more overwhelming than the agony as bells began to ring shrilly inside my ears and fireworks exploded behind my closed lids. Sheer heat erupted wherever Nick's fist made contact with my skin, blood rushing to the wounds, and I didn't understand what I had done wrong. Had I betrayed myself somehow? _I shouldn't have touched his knee... I shouldn't have come here, I shouldn't have..._ But my thoughts trailed off into nothing as the only thing my mind was able to focus on was the blaring, throbbing pain that encompassed my head, arms and chest, and I cried out as loudly as I could. I called his name, I begged him to stop, I told him I was sorry, I told him I wouldn't do it again, and I told him I would leave him alone.

I continued to babble, offering any promise I could think of, until I realized that all I could feel was the old pain, and that there were no new explosions on my body. The war against me had ended, and the only thing left was to rebuild the battered landscape, but I knew I would never be the same again. I dared to lower my arms from my face and I opened my eyes, staring up at Nick, who had leapt off of me and backed away towards the wall, staring at me as if he was more horrified at his actions than I was. His jaw slowly dropped open and he was quivering visibly now, his eyes unable to leave me. And then, suddenly, gasping, he fled, running to his room and slamming the door.

Wiping the tears that I hadn't even been aware I had shed away from my rapidly swelling face, I painfully sat up and groaned as my bruised abdomen protested. I brought my hands back up to my face again as I noticed I could see less and less out of my left eye. I tasted blood in my mouth and discovered the source of it. My bottom lip was split. My nose was stinging and bleeding slightly, but it didn't seem broken. I raised my shirt and saw the scattered purple patches that were growing on my pale skin. I looked up at Nick's closed door, a part of me terrified that he would come back to finish what he started. _Maybe he'll kill me_, I thought worriedly. It was a genuine concern. At the time, I really felt that if Nick could give me that bad of a beating, he was capable of murdering me.

Bones cracking, I got to my knees, telling myself to suck it up, and I clenched my jaw as I tried to tolerate the pain. I saw the abandoned novel on the floor. I don't know why, but I picked it up and pocketed it. Eventually, I was on my unsteady feet. With one last look at the closed door to Nick's bedroom, I limped to the door, cradling what I really hoped wasn't a sprained wrist.

The next day at work, everyone had been surprised at my appearance. I was doped up on enough pain meds to pretend like it looked worse than it was. And though Catherine and Grissom had both asked, and I had given them my excuse, it was my discussion with Sara that I really remembered.

"Jesus, Greg, you look like shit!" she'd exclaimed as I entered the break room for coffee. She was sitting with Nick at a table. He was clean shaven again, and looked just like he did before he'd left. If I'd have known he was there, I wouldn't have come in. But I needed my coffee. And Sara's presence made me feel a little safer, oddly enough. So I just nodded at her.

"Yeah, I know... It's not so bad, though. Really." Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Nick sink in his chair as he became more engrossed in the file he was looking at.

Sara, on the other hand, leapt out of her chair and made her way over to me. She looked appalled at my black eye and battered wrist. "What the hell happened to you? Who did this? I swear to God, I'll kick his ass so bad—"

"No," I interrupted quickly as I saw Nick wince. "I mean..." I shrugged, hoping I looked cute. "I was at a bar last night. Someone tried to tell me that Roger Moore was better than Sean Connery. I got a little carried away."

"A _little_?!" Sara cried.

I forced a triumphant looking smile. "We were both drunk and, hey, if you think _I_ look bad, you should see the _other_ guy."

It took a moment, but an amused smile slowly claimed her features as she shook her head. "The things you get in a bar brawl over... For future reference, Greg, James Bond isn't worth it."

I opened myself to say something witty when I heard chair legs scrape against the floor and Nick vanished out of the door to the break room. I blinked for a moment, then turned my attention back to Sara. "Hey, James Bond is worth _anything_," I said, and she laughed.

My wounds healed, but the rift between Nick and I seemed permanent. That is, until just over a year later...


	2. Steers and Queers Pt 1

**Part 2.1: Steers and Queers**

_**Author's Note:**_ Part Two is longer than I thought it would be, and therefore comes in two parts. The second part should be uploaded within the next forty-eight hours. Part Three should be posted by next week. I apologize in advance for the lack of Greg, but trust me when I assure you that he returns. Enjoy.

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"This fall I think you're riding for - it's a special kind of fall, a horrible kind. The man falling isn't permitted to feel or hear himself hit bottom. He just keeps falling and falling. The whole arrangement's designed for men who, at some time or other in their lives, were looking for something their own environment couldn't supply them with. Or they thought their own environment couldn't supply them with. So they gave up looking. They gave it up before they ever really even got started." --**J.D. Salinger, _The Catcher in the Rye_, Chapter 24, spoken by the character Mr. Antolini to Holden Caulfield  
**

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"_Nicky_! Would you come down for dinner already?!"

Just about to nip at a cat's tail in his dog form, the door to his room burst open, and his sister's voice really made its presence known.

"Don't make me unplug that thing, Nick," she warned, glaring at him with sharp brown eyes.

Nick chewed on his lip and tried to get just a little closer before Eve marched into the room and turned off the system.

"Aw, _man_!" Nick yelled. "I was almost to the next level!"

"Mouse Trap is a stupid game anyway," his sister said with a playful smile. "How come you never play Pac-Man?"

"Because Atari screwed up the graphics."

"Nick, don't use that language in this house, you know what Mom and Dad would say about that."

He rolled his eyes. "Fine. What's for dinner anyway."

"Spaghetti."

"Again?" he whined as he followed his sister out of the room, kicking his copy of _Night Rider_ out of the way of the door.

"What do you mean? I thought you _loved_ spaghetti."

"Not eight nights in a row," Nick mumbled as he followed Eve downstairs. They approached the living room, where Abby, Matt and Luke were already eating. He saw two empty chairs. "Mom and Dad working late again?"

"You bet, so you can afford those video games of yours," said Eve. She pointed at a chair by Abby. "Now sit and eat."

Nick dutifully slid into the chair next to his sister and slowly began to eat the stale spaghetti. He was certain it was leftovers from yesterday. He wondered how much spaghetti Eve would make at a time.

"How was work today?" Eve inquired softly, making Matt look up at her and wipe some sauce from his mouth.

He shrugged. "It was OK."

"Did you catch any criminals?"

"The usual."

"You know, Matt, it takes two to have a conversation."

Matt sighed and leaned back in his chair. "To be honest, it was pretty slow. They don't let me do much, being the rookie and all. Plus, Dad checks on me every other second."

"He's just proud of you, that's all," said Eve with a snide smile. "I, on the other hand, know better."

"Oh, shut up, Eve," Matt muttered, turning back to his food. "We don't need you here anyway, so you should just go home."

"I like having Eve here," Abby chimed. "Just like I like having you here, Matt. I don't think either of you should leave."

"That's sweet, Abby, but the birds have to leave the nest _someday_," Eve said pointedly, looking at Matt. "Judy already has a place to stay when she graduates this year. Rebecca's gonna stay with her, too, just until she finishes school. Judy still has a way to go, what with med school and all. Why is it that the women in this family aren't the clingy ones, Matt? Can you tell me that?"

"I'm not clingy," Luke muttered with his mouth full.

Eve smiled sweetly at him. "Trust me, Luke, if you're anything like your brother, you will be."

"Why do you do this every night, Evey?" Matt asked, with irked eyes. "You always gotta pick on me. Dad _loves_ having me here. I think that's what bothers you. You know I'm his favorite."

"How could you possibly be his favorite? You're a slob."

"Can we not talk about this please?" Abby begged. "I hate watching you two bicker over day-old spaghetti."

"Yeah, Eve, when are you gonna make anything different?" Matt spat. "Some babysitter you are."

"I'm not a babysitter, I'm the oldest," Eve snapped.

"And without you, _I'd_ be the oldest, and I take damn good care of this family."

"Matthew!"

"Evey!" Matt returned, mockingly. He turned back to his food. "I'll say whatever the fuck I want."

"Not in front of Nick and Abby, you won't!" Eve said, jumping to her feet.

"Please, it's not like I've never heard it before," Nick muttered inaudibly, making Abby giggle.

"I think you've had enough dinner for tonight, Matt," Eve said coldly.

"Evey, don't be like that," Abby pleaded. She looked to Luke for assistance, but he was his usual taciturn self as he continued to eat as if nothing was going on.

"No, Abby, I think she's right. If I eat anymore of this shit I might get sick. Hey Nick!" Matt called, making the youngest look up. "You wanna help me restore the GTO out in the garage?"

Nick's eyes lit up. "Sure!"

"You're not going anywhere, Nicky," Eve said suddenly, glaring at Matt. "Finish your dinner."

"Who do you think you are? Mom?" Matt laughed. "Eve, you're not so smart, just because you're getting a PhD. If I wanted to, I could have gotten a PhD."

"Oh really? In what? Being a... a jerk?" Eve returned indignantly.

Matt snickered. "Jesus won't hate you if you call me an asshole. I am an asshole. I know it. And these kids look up to me for it, don't you guys?"

Luke gave a grunt of approval. Abby shrugged. Nick was the only one to be verbal about it. "Sure do, Matt!"

"Thank you, Nick," Matt said with a nod. "Now come on. The GTO is waiting."

With a grin on his face, Nick leapt up from the table.

"Nicky, sit down!"

"Would you stop calling him that? You make it sound like he's a girl," Matt whined. "Quit emasculating him."

"Ooh, emasculating, that's a big word for you, isn't it?" Eve said snidely. "Did you just learn it today?"

"Fuck you!"

Eve glowered at him. "I'd like to see you use that language in front of Mom and Dad!"

Matt just rolled his eyes. "Dad worships the ground I walk on. I could do no wrong, so far as he's concerned. As for Mom, she just smiles and nods. Wait 'til I tell them what a bitch you've been these past few nights."

Next to him, Nick heard Abby grumble. "Here we go again." He watched as she pushed her plate away and rested her head on the table. Eve and Matt continued to fight, but they were no longer the focus of Nick's attention.

"What's up, Abby?" he inquired. She was the closest to him in age, only a year older than him, and it kept the two of them close.

"I'm so tired of their fighting," she groaned. She turned her head on the table, her blonde hair falling into the plate of spaghetti. Out of all of them, she was the only child with blonde hair. Nick's father said it was because of their Aunt Susan, and something about recessive genes. But the young teenager didn't know anything about genes. At least, not yet.

"Well, Matt's always been confrontational, you can't help that."

"It's not just him, listen to her go off about it too," Abby muttered. "And yet, when we all go to church on Sunday, we hold hands and pretend that we all love each other. I just wish we could be like that all the time, you know? Maybe if Becky and Judy were here..."

"Nah, that wouldn't help. They'd just take Eve's side and make Matt lash out more."

"Nick!"

The youngest Stokes gave a start at his name and saw Matt striding over to him and seizing his arm with great force. Nick allowed himself to be pulled out of his chair and off toward the garage as Eve called after them.

"For goodness sake, Matthew, it's 1986, not the fricking Stone Age!"

"You'd feel better if you said 'fucking,' Evey!" Matt called and then disappeared with Nick in the garage. Matt flipped on the lights and pulled out the toolbox, popping the hood. Nick eagerly assisted him, holding the toolbox in his lap as Matt bent over the hood, reconnecting the engine.

"She's gonna be beautiful when she's finished," Matt said proudly.

Nick agreed. "You've done a good job on it, Matt."

"I'm doing a _damn_ good job," Matt said, glancing at Nick with a smirk.

The door to the garage opened and Eve stood there, looking like she wanted to say something, but she instead growled, turned around and left.

Matt rolled his eyes and snorted. "What a bitch."

"She means well," Nick said, trying to stand up for his sister.

"The girl's never done a damn thing in her life," Matt muttered. He asked for a wrench and Nick handed him one. "She thinks she's so smart because she is an expert in Shakespeare and shit. As if knowing Shakespeare will get you anywhere in life. How are _you_ doing in school, Nick? Breaking lots of hearts, I hope."

"Er... I don't know, maybe," Nick muttered with a shrug. "I haven't thought much about girls."

"Aw, well you _should_, man," Matt said with a laugh. "I mean, you know... be smart and all that. God wants you to save yourself and everything. Or at least use a condom."

"Right," Nick muttered, nodding. "Actually... do you think Evey will be mad if I told her I'm failing English?"

Matt tossed his head back and laughed and tousled Nick's hair. "Oh, she'll be furious. Go and tell her. Can I watch?"

Nick rolled his eyes. "Ms. Wilson says I need a tutor. I was hoping Eve might do it."

"She'll say she doesn't have time, which is code for she doesn't _want_ to," Matt muttered. "Why don't you try someone from your school? A cute girl, perhaps?"

There was the sound of a car on the driveway and doors slamming and Nick leapt to his feet. "Mom and Dad are home!" he declared before racing back into the house just in time to see his parents come through the door. Abby and Eve came into the room too. Eve was drying off a dish.

"Hey, guys!" Mr. Stokes declared, throwing his arms open and hugging an eager Abby. "Where are Matt and Luke?"

"Luke's upstairs in his room. Matt's in the garage," said Eve.

Mrs. Stokes sighed as she hung up her coat. "It was a long day."

"Busting bad guys?" Nick chimed.

Like Matt had done earlier, Mr. Stokes ruffled Nick's hair. "You betchya, Poncho."

"I guess that's my cue to leave, then," said Eve with a smile.

"That's right, sweetheart, you head home," said Mrs. Stokes. "We'll take things from here."

"Will you be back tomorrow?" Abby asked.

"You bet, Abigail," Eve said with a smile.

"Nick, your English teacher called me today," Mrs. Stokes said warningly.

Nick shuffled on the spot. "Actually, I was going to ask Eve to tutor me."

"What? Are you having trouble in English?" Eve sounded like this was a personal insult. "Nicky, I would love to tutor you, but—"

"You have no time," Nick interrupted, dejectedly.

She smiled apologetically. "Your high school has a great tutoring program. Maybe you could find someone there."

"And no girls!" Mr. Stokes said sharply. "I don't want any pretty face distracting you from your work."

"Yes, sir," Nick said, nodding.

"I'll call Mrs. Palmer, from work," said Mrs. Stokes. "Her son is a junior in AP English. I'm sure he'd like the extra cash."

"OK, Mom," Nick said, nodding.

"I want him to start on Monday, is that OK with you, Nicky?"

"Yes, ma'am."

* * *

Tony Palmer was not a very broad teenager. His frame was slight, but he was on the swim team, so his muscles were still quite defined, just not very large. His slender frame allowed him to torpedo through the water at break-neck speeds. And Nick found himself mentally mapping out every curve of it as the boy spoke of Harper Lee. A mop of light brown hair fell across his forehead, almost obscuring his eyes. His toned arms bent at the elbow and rested on the table as Tony leaned on them, his voice clear and strangely melodious as he talked about Atticus Finch, Scout and Jem, Mayella Ewell and Tom Robinson, and of course, Boo Radley. For the first time ever, Nick found himself actually engaged in literature, fascinated by the words and stories that poured out of Tony's mouth as the older teen explained ninth grade literature to Nick.

"So the title," Nick began slowly, eager to impress but afraid of being wrong, "is in reference to that line that Atticus says, about how it's a sin to kill a mockingbird..."

"Right!" Tony exclaimed with a proud grin. "And why did Lee decide to title the book that?"

"It's an... allegory?" Nick guessed. Tony pursed his lips and began to shake his head, when Nick fell over himself trying to find the right word. "Allusion! It's alluding to what happens with Tom Robinson..."

"And again with Boo Radley," Tony added. "What does it mean?"

Nick struggled to grasp the meaning. "It means that... we shouldn't... be so quick to attack others who aren't doing any real harm to us. It means that if we... _do_ that... then... _we're_ the monsters."

Tony was triumphant. "Exactly!"

Nick sighed with relief, warmth flooding his body, unsure exactly why he felt so pleased with himself whenever he made Tony happy.

"I think we should start on _The Catcher In The Rye_ today," said Tony, pulling the book out of his bag. "Have you started it?"

"Aw, I tried," Nick said, squirming, and it was the truth. "But it was hard. It wasn't that interesting, the beginning was slow. Also, Joby—that's the neighbor's dog, he..." Nick felt his face flush, but he wasn't sure why. "He kind of ate it. I swear, it's not an excuse, Luke had borrowed my bag and he had a ham sandwich right next to the book and—"

Tony smiled and leaned across the table, pushing his copy of Salinger's novel into Nick's hands, who took it, his hands shaking. "You can have mine," said Tony.

Nick opened the worn copy, which had scattered notes in the margins, and looked up at Tony in awe, as if the man had just given him something priceless. "I couldn't..."

"Why not?"

"You've written in it!"

"Well yeah, I think that'll help you," Tony said with a laugh. "I've underlined key passages and made note of recurring themes in the margins. _Catcher_ is one of my all-time favorite books, Nick, and I want to share that with you—" He seemed startled at this confession and his smile faded slightly. He was flustered and tried to make up for it, running a shaky hand through his hair. "I mean, I want to help you understand it, you know. For class."

"Right," Nick said, nodding vigorously as he felt his heart rate increase. "Yeah. I get it."

Tony sighed with relief. "Good." He rose to his feet and gathered up his papers. "Well, I guess I'll see you next week then..."

"Maybe... we could hang out before then..." Nick said slowly, cautiously. Tony froze, and then a small smile crept across his features.

"Yeah... Yeah, I'd like that. You know, _Highlander_ just came out, I heard that was pretty good."

Nick pursed his lips. "Yeah... that sounds great."

* * *

Over the next few days, Nick diligently kept up with his reading, and was almost done with the novel by the time he met up with Tony to go to the movies later that week. Something had felt intrinsically _right_, sitting there in that dark theater, next to that beautiful boy. Both of them had seemed to have dressed up a little nicer for the occasion. Nick wore his Ray-Bans and his best jean jacket, hoping against hope that he looked as cool as the guys on TV. In the movie theater, he could tell that Tony had put on a little too much cologne, but the thought of it only made him smile. After the movie, they had decided to hang out at a nearby arcade for a few hours, playing a few video games and sharing a pizza.

By the time the next week rolled around, Nick had read _The Catcher in the Rye_ twice, and was ready to dazzle Tony with his knowledge. He was playing his Atari when Tony knocked on the door and entered the bedroom. Nick immediately switched off the game system and moved to the desk, where Tony sat next to him.

"I finished the book," Nick said proudly. "I know it inside and out now."

"You do?" Tony sounded impressed. "So why don't you tell me about it."

"It's about growing up!" Nick declared, excited that he had come up with that all on his own. "Holden doesn't want to. That's why he keeps wandering around for most of the book. He doesn't know where he can go where he can remain a kid. So he goes to see Phoebe."

"That's great, Nick!" Tony exclaimed. "It's only been a few weeks, and already you're a master of Harper Lee, and you really have a good grasp of Salinger too." He reached out and tousled Nick's hair playfully. "I'm so proud of you."

Nick couldn't help but beam as the heat rushed through his body just from the sheer proximity of Tony Palmer. It took Nick a moment to realize that Tony's hand had fallen from Nick's hair and rested on his shoulder, his thumb moving back and forth against the neckline of Nick's Phish T-shirt. Nick didn't know why, but he really didn't want Tony to pull away. But as if Nick's thoughts were the cause of it, Tony took a deep breath and withdrew the hand, which fell into his lap, and he fiddled with them there.

"So what do you want to discuss?" Tony asked after a while, trying to hide a stutter. This was unusual, because Tony normally had a list of themes and motifs to go over about the novel.

"Um... I don't know, where do you think we should start?" Nick probed. He moved his chair slightly closer to Tony's.

Tony looked up, his face flushed. "We could... start with... Holden..." he said slowly, his eyes alight. His hand moved to grip Nick's knee, sending electric tingles throughout the young teen's body.

Nick leaned closer, trying to show Tony that he wanted this. "Do we have to talk about the book?" he whispered.

Tony's grin broadened and he shook his head, his other hand flying to Nick's face, and their lips crashed against each other, sloppily and unskillfully. Nick had never been kissed before—not by anyone he'd wanted to kiss him—but he had always wondered how it would feel, someone else's lips crushed up against his, someone else's tongue probing his mouth. It felt strange at first, but oh so excitingly awkward, and Nick wanted to learn all the tricks. He wanted to explore, to adventure into this crazy world of teenage hormones, and he wanted to do it with Tony Palmer.

The chair legs scraped against the floor, and they both rose to their feet simultaneously, their lips never breaking contact for more than a second. Tony's hands wrapped around Nick's torso as their chests pressed against each other and they both stumbled back to Nick's bed. Nick fell backwards, his hands moving down Tony's shoulders, charting out the grooves in his toned chest beneath Tony's shirt with his fingertips. Tony straddled him, his lips finally breaking away from Nick's to travel down the younger teen's neck, and Nick found himself entangling his hands in Tony's hair, hugging the older teen's head against his neck, closing his eyes, somehow instinctively knowing what to do. He was overflowing with wonder and passion and want, and he needed to be as close to Tony as possible. He had never before felt so connected to another individual, and his mind was reeling until the sound of his bedroom door opening penetrated his thoughts and Tony was no longer on top of him.

The older teen had rolled onto his side and was trying to catch his breath as he looked at Nick with feigned innocence. Startled, his heart racing, Nick looked from Tony who was lying next to him, to the person who stood in the doorway, watching them both with a classically inscrutable expression.

"Nick," said Luke calmly, his voice steady, as if he had seen nothing. "Eve says time for dinner."

"Oh..." Nick mumbled. "Yeah. Tony and I were just... talking about... Holden Caulfield. Did you ever read _The Catcher in the Rye_, Luke?"

"No," Luke said succinctly.

"Well you should," said Nick, amazed at how out of breath he sounded.

"I think you should go home now, Tony," Luke said.

Tony chewed on his lip and nodded. Nick could sense him shaking as the older teen moved off of Nick's bed and collected his things.

Luke turned back to Nick. "Be downstairs in two minutes, or I'm sending Matt up."

Nick nodded and the door slammed. He turned to Tony, breathless. "What _was _that?" he asked.

"I don't know," said Tony as he shouldered his backpack. He looked at Nick, his face as blanched as chalk. "You... I mean, did you... _like_ it?"

Speechless, Nick could do nothing but nod. "I've been... thinking about you a lot."

Tony laughed, lightly, still in shock. "Yeah... yeah, me too, but... we shouldn't do this here. Not with your family around."

"No," Nick agreed. "I'll... I'll meet up with you tomorrow? On Saturday? We could chill at the arcade."

"Yeah, that sounds awesome," said Tony, nodding. "I'll see you tomorrow... Nick." He smiled, and then was out the door. Nick waited as he heard his steps echo as he ran down the stairs. And then, Nick came out of his room and went down to dinner.

"So how was studying?" Eve asked him conversationally when he arrived, over yet another plate of spaghetti.

"It was great," Nick said cheerily. He heard Luke snort, but tried to ignore it. "I'm really getting it now. This literature thing. It's not as boring as I thought."

Eve beamed at him. "I'm glad to hear you say that, Nicky. I love books."

"Too bad it's illegal to marry them," Matt said with a smirk.

"Shut up, Matt," Eve groaned.

Nick saw Abby roll her eyes, but the youngest girl said nothing.

"With good reason, too," Matt pointed out. "You know there are folks who would marry their _dog_ if it was legal? I swear, if these aren't the signs of the apocalypse, I don't know what is. Do you think the world will end in the year 2000, Evey?"

"No," Eve said simply. "And even if it does, I believe God will deliver us."

"He damn well better," Matt muttered. "I'm a good Christian, I've paid my dues. He needs to keep me away from all those heathens and faggots—"

"Matt, watch your mouth," Eve warned.

Nick's heart sank as he tried to swallow the spaghetti in his mouth and found it difficult. Luke's eyes were on him, scrutinizing.

"Do you ever wonder if maybe the Bible is wrong?"

Eve stopped and set her fork down as she looked up in shock at her baby sister. "What do you mean, Abby?"

The blonde squirmed under her big sister's gaze. "I mean... just some things..."

"Who's been putting ideas into your head?" Matt demanded. "I'll deck their ass so fast..."

"Like, you swear, Matt. Even though Mom and Dad and the Bible and everyone says it's wrong."

"There isn't nothing in the Bible that says I can't say the word fuck whenever I want to," Matt said with a clever smirk. "Because 'fuck' wasn't a word in Jesus' time."

"But I'm sure if it _had_ been, they would have forbid its usage," Eve pointed out. "Abby, if you have questions, you can always talk to Father Miller this Sunday. God will guide you home."

"Well I mean... just... some things don't make a whole lot of sense..." Abby squirmed in her chair.

"Like I said, you can take this up with Father Miller on Sunday," Eve said, as if that were the end of the conversation.

Abby sighed and gave up, sulking in her chair, her eyes resting on the spaghetti. Nick watched her momentarily until she looked up at him. He looked sharply away again. His attention was drawn to Luke again, who was leaning close to Matt and whispering something in the eldest brother's ear. Nick watched Matt's expression harden, and then, strangely, curl into a hideous smile as he responded to Luke's words.

"There are no secrets at the dinner table!" Eve said sharply.

"OK, we'll stop," Matt agreed.

"What were you two whispering about?" Abby asked.

"The Bible," Luke muttered, before stuffing his face full of spaghetti.

After dinner, Matt said that he and Luke were going to play some night basketball. Nick volunteered to help Eve wash the dishes and Abby said she was going upstairs to her room to write in her journal. A little while later, their parents returned home.

"I guess I'll be leaving then," said Eve.

"Hold your horses, Eve," called Mrs. Stokes. "Your father and I both have trials tomorrow. I know you have your own life, sweetheart, but it would really help if you could stay the night tonight. Both of us will be up really early tomorrow, and it makes us feel a whole lot better knowing you're here with your brothers and sister."

Eve nodded, and so she stayed over, bunking in Abby's room, which, once upon a time, used to be her room. Nick fell restlessly to sleep, dreaming of the next day when he would see Tony again.


	3. Steers and Queers Pt 2

**Part 2.2: Steers and Queers  
**

* * *

"Among other things, you'll find that you're not the first person who was ever confused and frightened and even sickened by human behavior. You're by no means alone on that score, you'll be excited and _stimulated_ to know. Many, many men have been just as troubled morally and spiritually as you are right now. Happily, some of them kept records of their troubles. You'll learn from them - if you want to. Just as someday, if you have something to offer, someone will learn something from you. It's a beautiful reciprocal arrangement. And it isn't education. It's history. It's poetry." —**J.D. Salinger, _The Catcher in the Rye_, Chapter 24, spoken by the character Mr. Antolini to Holden Caulfield  
**

* * *

He didn't want to wake up. It was a Saturday, and he relished sleeping in. He was past the age where he would wake up for the morning cartoons. But the door opening jarred him from his sleep as effectively as an alarm clock, and he wasn't sure why. He heard someone enter and he rolled over in his bed, willing them to go away so he could fall back asleep.

He heard someone sit in a chair by his bed, and that same person lightly stroked his hair. That's when he knew something was wrong. He turned in his bed again and blinked the sandy sleep from his eyes. Eve's dark, wavy hair was the first thing he saw, and then her soft, ivory features. And then, her bloodshot brown eyes. She had been crying.

"What happened?" Nick asked, suddenly wide awake as he sat up in his bed.

"Nicky..." she breathed, shaking her head. "You're not going to have any more tutoring sessions with Tony Palmer."

Nick's heart leapt into his throat and threatened to choke him. _This is it_, he thought to himself. _Luke told Matt and Eve and now they'll hate me. That's why she's been crying._

He felt the urge to explain himself as he felt very warm, sticky sweat beginning to collect on his brow, but he couldn't find the words. "Evey, I didn't... I mean, I'm..."

"Sh," she hushed with a smile. "Nicky. Something happened to Tony."

This caught the youngest Stokes slightly off guard, but the fear in him remained. "What do you mean?"

"God help him..." Eve breathed, blinking as her eyes gravitated to the ceiling. She took a deep breath. "I know you two were good friends, and he was a decent person. He inspired you to find the gems in literature, and I will _always_ be thankful to him for that. God sent him here to us, I'm sure of that."

"What _happened_, Evey?" Nick demanded nervously, tired of all her talk about God. It bothered him that she spoke about Tony in past tense.

"Matt's unit was called onto a scene very early this morning," Eve explained. "It was so bad, they called Matt in to help out. Somebody beat him, Nicky. Someone beat him really bad."

And Nick knew it had to be bad, for Eve to use such poor grammar. "Is he...?"

"He's in critical condition," Eve explained. "They beat him on the corner, just outside his own house. His parents were asleep, so they don't know why he was out there so late. They thought he was in bed. And then his attackers just left him there, bloody and broken, for hours... and no one in this neighborhood is _out_ past nine o'clock at night, really, so no one even saw him until someone drove by and called the police. I just thought that you should hear it from me first."

All the blood drained from Nick's face and he felt the cold nausea grip his stomach and squeeze tightly, twisting and tying knots Nick wasn't sure he would ever be able to untangle. His breathing was ragged.

"Do they know... I mean... why?"

Eve shook her head. "Matt's looking into it personally," she assured him. "He said he'll take care of it."

A horrible thought struck Nick. _Matt_. "Matty..."

Eve nodded. "That's right, Matty. You haven't called him that since you were nine."

He felt his eyes sting, but he wiped them with the back of his hand, refusing to allow the tears to blossom in front of his eldest sister. He wanted to tell her, but he didn't know how. He wasn't sure how she would react. "Eve, I'm... I'm scared that maybe..."

"Hush," she cooed, leaning forward and taking her youngest brother in her arms. "Don't be scared. We live in an otherwise safe neighborhood with a cop in the family, a judge, and a DA. You're safe here, I promise."

But Nick's fears were not assuaged as he tried to calm his desperate breathing, inhaling the scent of her strawberry shampoo as he buried his face in her hair. He wasn't sure why, but he suddenly needed Abby.

"Where's Abby?"

Eve pulled away from him and smiled. "You are too sweet. Abby's fine, she's out biking with a friend." She must have misinterpreted his question.

"Does she know?"

"Not yet, no," Eve whispered. "I only just heard about half an hour ago, when Matt came home and told me where he'd been all night."

"Matt's here?" Nick hadn't intended for his voice to crack.

Eve nodded. "You see? He may not be good for much, but at least he's strong, I'll give him that. And Luke's here, too. And Mom and Dad are coming home later today, they promised."

"Eve..." Nick began. "Luke and Matt... I think maybe they may have had something to do with this."

Eve's brow furrowed. "Why would you say that, Nicky?"

He searched for a reason that wouldn't condemn him. "They just... they never liked Tony much. I think Matt may have... may have thought..."

"What is it, baby brother, you know you can tell me anything," she cajoled with a heavenly smile.

But Nick wasn't sure that was the truth. What he and Tony had done the night before was not entirely welcome in their religion or their family. While Matt openly cursed gays, Eve was worse. She often said that good Christians should pity the gays. And Nick didn't want to be pitied. He didn't want to be told that the only time he'd felt right in his whole life was wrong. He didn't want Eve to look at him with disgust, to send him off to Father Miller to be 'cured.' He didn't feel like he was diseased. Although, he did feel sick to his stomach.

But too many fears of what Eve would think of him and what she would do if she ever found out swirled around inside of his head. So instead of speaking up for justice for Tony, Nick kept his peace.

"I don't know," Nick finally mumbled. "I'm just... confused."

"We all are, Nicky," she whispered. "But God has a plan for all of us. You'll see."

Nick couldn't accept that. Why did God's plan involve brutal beatings for some and a life of ostracizing solitude for others, while still others got to live normal, long, healthy, happy lives? It would be a question that would haunt Nick for years to come.

"Wanna help me bake cookies for the Palmers?" Eve asked after a moment, jarring Nick from his thoughts.

He stared at her a moment. "You think cookies will make them feel better?"

Eve seemed slightly surprised by this response. "Well... no. I mean, they're just cookies, but... every little bit helps, right?"

Feeling grim and nauseous, Nick couldn't think of any other activity that would help, so he reluctantly agreed, though he took no pleasure in sitting in the kitchen with his sister, mostly in silence. If words were exchanged, it was generally on Eve's part, or a conversation about the recipe. All the while, Nick was on guard for Luke or Matt, but he saw neither of his brothers all morning.

After the cookies were all finished, Eve looked at her watch. "I should be picking Abby up soon," she said quietly. "I'll take these to the Palmers on my way to get her."

"Can I come?" Nick chimed. In all honesty, he didn't _really_ want to see the faces of Tony's parents, but he didn't want to be left alone in the house with Matt and Luke either.

"Actually, I think it would be better if you stayed here this time, Nicky," Eve told him.

"Why?" Nick didn't understand, and he was beginning to panic slightly.

She smiled at him again, that typical smile of hers, where she was trying to make him think that everything was perfect and nothing was wrong, although something was always very wrong. "I just don't think it would be a good idea for you, sweetie. Besides, I'm gonna be running a few errands before I pick up Abby, like groceries. Maybe we can have something _other_ than spaghetti for dinner tonight, how does that sound?"

Nick felt like she was patronizing him. "I want to tell the Palmers that I'm sorry about what happened. Stop treating me like I'm five years old. I want to come!"

"I'm not going to be back for a while. I have a lot of things to do. I need to drop off these cookies, go shopping, check with my professors about my dissertation, pick up the dry cleaning, get Abby... It would be easier if I didn't have to worry about you fidgeting in the car while I'm doing these things."

"I'll be quiet. I'll help you pick out something for dinner. I'll carry the dry cleaning. I'll talk to you about your dissertation, I don't _care_, Evey, I want to _come_!"

Eve pursed her lips, and he saw the tears magnify her dark eyes. "The truth is, Nicky, that I need some time alone to think, OK?"

"You didn't even _know_ him!" Nick burst out suddenly. "He wasn't _your_ friend, he was _mine_!"

"He was a _child_!" Eve interjected, her voice a hysterical growl. "Just like you are."

"I am _not_ a _child_, Evey!" Nick protested. "I'm fifteen years old—"

"And Tony was seventeen. And that's still _way_ too young to _die_!"

Nick was stunned into silence. "You said he's not dead yet..."

Eve licked her lips and rubbed her arms. "No, not yet."

Nick felt like his knees would give out beneath him. He stumbled backwards and leaned against the refrigerator for support. He heard Eve take a deep, shuddering breath.

"It's always hard to understand why these happen to kids so young, who don't deserve it, who had their whole life ahead of them. I just keep thinking, Nicky... What if it had been you? Or Abby? Or Luke?" Eve raked her shaking hands through her hair. "I just... I need some time to deal with this, you know?"

Nick said nothing as he slid down the wall, Tony's face swimming before his vision, Tony's melodic voice echoing in his ears. It took him a moment to realize that Eve had abandoned him there on the kitchen floor. He heard the front door to the house slam, but he didn't move. He felt he could barely breathe. He slowly brought his hands up to cover his face, closing his eyes as he forced himself to take deep breaths. He imagined that he was going to go to the arcade today, and he would meet Tony there. He imagined that the junior would be excited to see him, and would take his hand surreptitiously under the table as they shared a pizza. He imagined that they would play video games and joke and laugh. And then afterwards, he imagined Tony dragging him into the photo booth where they would snap a few goofy pictures. It occurred to Nick that he had no pictures of Tony. The older teen had been enrolled at a different high school, so Nick didn't even have the yearbook to rely on.

But in his imagination, he had that single roll of photos from that booth. As Nick tried to exit the booth, Tony seized his hand and pulled him back around so hard, Nick stumbled into him, and their lips collided. Nick's hands entangled themselves in Tony's mop of hair, and the smell of Tony's cologne permeated Nick's nostrils. He would never forget that scent, or the way Tony's soft lips felt against his, or how safe and comfortable he felt in Tony's arms.

"We shouldn't do this here. Not with your family around," Tony whispered as Nick planted sloppy, hungry kisses down his neck.

"My family isn't here," Nick returned, his hands wrapping tightly around Tony.

"Yes, they are," Tony told him. "They're always here, Nick. They'll always be wherever you are."

"I am not my family."

"You are a large part of your family."

"Shut up and kiss me." Nick claimed Tony's lips for his own and the older teen obliged eagerly. But eventually, Tony broke the kiss and looked at Nick with swirling brown eyes.

"This is wrong," he told Nick frankly.

Nick was confused. "I don't understand..."

"Two guys aren't supposed to be together like this. It's against God."

"You sound like my sister," Nick groaned, moving to kiss Tony again, but Tony dodged Nick's lips.

"It's a sin, Nick. You'll go to Hell for this. We'll _both_ go to Hell for this."

Nick was suddenly very cold. "Don't talk like that, Tony. Please, don't talk like that."

"It's the truth," Tony breathed. "It's what your parents and your siblings and Father Miller have been telling you all these years. If they all believe it, then it must be the truth."

"How can something that feels so right be a sin?" Nick begged. "I don't know what the words God or love mean anymore, but I swear too _God_ that I love you."

"You can't love me," Tony whispered. "First of all, we're kids. And second of all, there is no such thing as romantic love between two men."

"Then why did you kiss me?" Nick asked, desperate.

"Because I am a demon," Tony replied. "Don't you know anything about the Bible? God was testing you, Nick. And you failed."

"Don't say these things, Tony, please, I love you."

Tony reached out and stroked his hair with a kind smile. "Your love is dirty," he told him. "And you must be punished for your sin."

Tony's hand clenched into a fist, gripping Nick's hair and making the younger teen cry out. Nick's eyes snapped open and he realized that he had fallen asleep in the kitchen. He wasn't sure for how long, but someone else's hand was entangled in his hair, forcing him to his feet. As his eyes focused, he realized with horror that it was Luke, with Matt standing in front of him.

"Hi there, Nicky!" Matt said cheerfully.

Nick's nausea intensified. Matt _never_ called him that. Luke pulled on the back of his hair, forcing Nick's head back. He felt Matt move closer, and the oldest brother's fingers carefully wrapped around Nick's throat. Although it didn't make much difference, as Nick was already struggling to breathe.

"Luke saw you with that faggot yesterday," Matt hissed in his ear. "I bet you thought you got away with a sin like that."

He yanked Nick out of Luke's grip by the throat and Nick swore he heard something crack as he was tossed to the floor of the kitchen. He scrambled onto his back and scuttled away towards the cabinets.

"Did you beat up Tony?!" Nick demanded when he could breathe again. He rubbed his neck as his two brothers approached.

"It's a shame that faggotry isn't a crime in these United States," Matt snarled as he seized Nick by the front of his shirt. "If I had my way, there'd only be steers in Texas." He brought his fist back and Nick tried to shield his face with his hands but it was too late. Matt struck him hard in the jaw, and white hot pain radiated from the wound as Nick emitted a dry sob. He was terrified that Matt and Luke would beat him like they had done to Tony.

As if responding to his thoughts, Matt continued talking. "Now we're not gonna hurt you too bad," he explained. "You're our brother and all, and we love you. But we need you to understand..." He swiped Nick again, doubling the pain. "That sort of thing can't be tolerated in this family."

Nick cried out as Matt tossed him to the floor again, falling onto his hands and knees until Luke brought his foot up between Nick's ribs, making the youngest gasp for air.

"That's it Luke, teach him the consequences of going against God."

Nick tried to crawl away, but one of his brothers stepped hard on his back, pushing him onto his stomach. Another foot caught his hands and he screamed as he felt his fingers crunch beneath it.

"Careful, Luke, we don't want anything broken," Matt warned.

Luke raised his foot and Nick drew his hand into him, cradling it as it began to throb. But then he was kicked in the side again and he grunted. He tried to scramble to his hands and knees once more but every time he tried he got pushed down. His brothers avoided kicking his face, aiming mostly for his stomach, chest, legs and back. Matt kicked him agonizingly hard beneath the ribs and Nick rolled over onto his back. Luke seized his arms and dragged him to his feet, but Nick was too exhausted to stand as Matt delivered blows to his stomach and chest. Nick struggled against Luke's restraints, _wanting_ to fight back, wanting to try and do anything to make Matt stop in his furious tirade. Matt brought back his fist one last time and caught Nick in the eye before a scream ripped through the air that wasn't Nick's own.

"What the _fuck_ are you two _doing_?!"

The voice was shrill and panicked, and he recognized it, but not her language. He felt Luke's grip on him slacken and he wavered before leaning against the wall and sliding to the floor, his head pounding, his whole body aching. He curled his fingers to make sure he still could. To his relief, they all moved.

"Nick!" someone else yelled, a softer voice, with sweeter, more angelic tones. He heard running footsteps, and someone was holding him, clutching his head to her chest, her arms wrapped around him. He knew by the smell of vanilla and cinnamon that it was his sister, Abby. He relaxed in her embrace, feeling as if she were a shield from his brothers, as if he was finally safe again. He blinked blearily to try and make out the scene, but his left eye was swollen shut and he could only see out of one.

Eve was standing livid in the doorway of the kitchen, her hair frazzled, her hands clenched into fists as she glowered at Matt, who did not look a bit remorseful for his actions. Luke stood by the sink with folded arms, his eyes still on Nick and Abby. Abby had begun stroking her little brother's hair, firmly but sweetly, reassuring him that she would take care of him at all costs. It was all too much, and Nick felt the tears scorch his eyes like acid as they blazed burning trails down his swelling cheeks, so he shut his eye again.

"What the _hell_ is your problem, Matthew?! Beating up your _own brother_?! Are you fucking psychotic?!"

"There we go, Evey. I told you swearing would make you feel better."

"Shut up," Eve snapped through gritted teeth. "What is the meaning of this? Why would even _dare_ to hurt poor Nicky? What the hell did he ever do to you?!"

"He's fucking queer, Evey," Luke muttered in a low voice.

There was a sharp intake of breath. "Don't you use that language, Luke John Stokes, or so help me _God_—"

"It's true, Evey," Matt said calmly. "Our baby brother's a faggot."

"Matthew, _stop it_. Stop _saying_ these things! Nick did _nothing wrong_! Or at least nothing that deserves getting _beat up _over!"

"He made out with another faggot," Matt told her. "Tony Palmer. Under this very roof. In his bedroom. If Luke hadn't interrupted them, I don't _know_ what other sins they would have committed."

Eve was silent for a moment, which struck Nick as unusual. He felt Abby's grip on him tighten. He needed to see what was going on, so he opened his good eye once more. Eve still stood by the door, her arms folded and her lips pursed. She seemed to be making some sort of decision. Her stony eyes rested on Matt, who didn't seem at all fazed under her scrutiny. She took deep breaths before her eyes moved to Nick. They moved back to Matt again.

"Tony Palmer was a faggot?" she finally whispered. Hearing that word on her tongue sent shivers up Nick's spine and his stomach contorted. Eve _never_ used these words, and the fact that she was now scared him to death.

He saw Matt nod. "You bet."

"Matthew..." Eve began slowly, her voice low and shaking. "Please, Matthew... tell me you aren't responsible for Tony Palmer's hospitalization."

"If that's what you want to hear, Evey, I'll tell you anything."

The air in the room froze, and the sharp crystals sliced Nick's lungs apart.

"Were you going to do the same to Nicholas?" She sounded accusatory, but calm.

"No. Never. We just wanted him to understand that what he did was unacceptable. Nothing's broken. We made sure of that."

"Does that make it right?" a loud voice demanded from out of nowhere and it took Nick a moment to recognize that it was Abby who had spoken.

But Eve and Matt both ignored her. Eve's next words were slow and deliberate. "If Mom and Dad found out what you two did... if the neighbors ever heard that you beat on your own baby brother... there would be chaos. You would probably go to prison."

Neither Matt nor Luke said anything in response. They knew it was the truth.

Eve took a deep breath. "Whatever happens, this _must_ be resolved within the family. Within this kitchen. We'll clean Nick's blood up off of the floor, get rid of everything suspicious. I'll tell Mom and Dad that Nick was attacked outside, by a mugger—"

"Evey, you can't be _serious_—"

"Be quiet, Abby, this doesn't concern you," Eve interrupted coldly. She took another trembling breath. "We don't know who attacked Nick. He didn't see his attacker." She turned to Nick then, her eyes pleading. "Did you, Nick?"

The youngest Stokes wasn't sure what to say. If he told the truth, his secret would be out to his parents and the whole neighborhood, and he would have been responsible for putting his two brothers, his _only_ two brothers, whom he loved and respected—or at least he thought he did—in prison. But if he lied... if he lied...

"Don't do it, Nicky," Abby whispered, so Eve couldn't hear. "What they did was wrong. They should pay."

Nick closed his eyes, trying to think. Finally, he shook his head. "No, I didn't see anything," he choked, surprise at how fragile his cracked voice sounded.

"We don't know who attacked him," Eve reiterated. "And it's sad, but there's nothing we can do."

"Thanks, Evey..." Matt began.

"Don't thank me," Eve said sharply. "This is on one condition. That you _never_ hurt Nick again."

"If he stops being queer, I'll have no reason to hurt him," said Matt.

Nick expected Eve to protest this. He expected her to say, "_No, it doesn't matter what Nick does, you can never hurt him again._"

But instead, she simply said, "Agreed."

The word echoed dully inside Nick's skull as his siblings came to a grim accord. It was clear then, that being gay wasn't only unwelcome in their family, it was taboo. He felt the sobs build in his chest but was reluctant to let them out. He buried his face in Abby's shoulder and quietly released them into her, his body rattling as she soothed him, clinging to him, hushing him like a child after a terrible nightmare.

"Nicky..." he heard Eve whisper, but he didn't want to leave the safety of Abby's embrace. "Nicky, come here, I need too have a look at you. I need to clean you up and make sure that you don't need to take a trip to the hospital..."

She put a hand on his shoulder, but he jerked out of her grip, and he felt Abby readjust her grip on him, her arms like ropes binding Nick to her.

"Can't you see he doesn't want you to touch him?" she snapped defensively.

"I'm your big sister, Nick."

"So am I!" Abby snapped.

"I'm the oldest. I know how to take proper care of you."

"Bullshit!" Abby snarled.

"Abigail!" Eve reprimanded.

"You think saying our full names every time we swear is going to make it better? You think that pretending Matty and Luke didn't do anything is the right thing to _do_? He practically admitted to beating Tony Palmer half to death. We caught them _red handed_ beating up _our baby brother_, and you have the audacity to stand there and tell them they were _justified_?!"

Though Nick could see nothing of what was taking place, he felt strong hands seize his shoulders and nails dig into his skin as he was pried away from his great defender. His eyes snapped open in time to see Abby leap to her feet, her hazel eyes ferocious as she shot daggers at their oldest sister, who guided Nick to a chair and sat him down. Eve kneeled down in front of him and pushed his hair away from his face, her expression grim. Looking around, Nick noticed that Luke and Matt were no longer there, and he was glad for that. Abby was at his side immediately and she clutched his hand, the one that Luke hadn't stepped on.

"Aren't you going to answer me?"

"Answer what?" Eve returned, coldly. "Your questions are ludicrous. Don't you understand that they could go to _jail_? Do you _want_ to break up this family?"

"Do you?" Abby shrieked. "Like it or not, Eve, this family is _broken_. You're not _fixing _it, you're making things _worse_! Just _look_ at your baby brother! The one you swore to Mom and Dad that you would protect with everything you had. _Look_ at him, Evey, and _tell _me that this is a normal, functional family."

Eve closed her eyes and took a deep breath as her hands rested on Nick's shoulders. "Abby," she said calmly. "Would you please go to pantry and get me the first aid kit?"

Visibly annoyed, Abby clenched her fists and growled before marching off to do her sister's bidding.

Eve opened her eyes again and looked at Nick. "You understand, don't you? Why we have to this?"

He didn't, but he nodded anyway. Eve returned the nod, her dark eyes cloudy. Abby came running back and dropped the kit at Eve's feet. The eldest pulled out a white cloth and poured antiseptic on it. She reached up to Nick's face.

"Now this may sting a little..." she warned.

Nick gritted his teeth and prepared himself for it. The acidic solution bit into his wounds and he flinched, but it didn't hurt half as much as Eve's words.

"He's our baby _brother_, Evey."

"I _know_ that, Abby," Eve snapped. "That's why I'm taking care of him."

"By forcing him to lie about what happened to him? When it wasn't even his _fault_? Lying is a _sin_, remember, Eve?"

"He needs _help_, Abby," Eve cried. "And this was _not_ the way to go about it, I agree. And there are worse sins than lying, especially if we're lying to protect our family. But maybe some good can still come of this—"

"_What_ good, Eve? He's been beaten to a pulp!"

"Nothing looks broken," Eve returned. "The boys were true to their word. He's just a little battered and shaken, but he'll be fine. All I'm saying is, maybe this will teach him not to do anything like this again. Right, Nick?"

Again, Nick nodded. Abby growled, but Eve continued to speak.

"You have to understand that what you did... It's not appropriate. Not for someone like you. You're a good person, Nick. We just want to help you. Matthew, his methods are—"

"Barbaric?" Abby supplied.

"—unorthodox, but he means well. You have to understand, Nicky, we all _mean well_."

"Matt's right," Abby said, breathless as she shook her head. "You really _are_ a bitch."

"Abby, you cuss one more time, and I'm sending you to your room," Eve warned.

"Go ahead and try it," Abby dared.

"Go ahead and cuss again," Eve returned.

But Abby pursed her lips and folded her arms. She may be willing to challenge Eve, but Eve was still her oldest sister, and there were certain lines the blonde wasn't ready to cross. "Do you really think the punishment fits the crime, Eve? Do you really think that Tony deserved to be beaten like that just because he was gay? He could _die_. Is _death_ the appropriate punishment? If so, why not just kill Nick—"

"I'm sorry about what happened to Tony, I truly am," Eve interrupted. "If he dies, then his judgment is in the hands of God, not us. As is Matthew's, as is Luke's, and as is mine. As is Nick's."

"If that's true," Abby began with a trembling voice, "then if I were you, I would be deathly worried about my immortal soul. The way you sold out your _own brother_—"

"And turning Matt and Luke in, what would that do, Abby, huh?!" Eve finally screamed, spilling the antiseptic on the floor where it mingled with Nick's blood stains. "They're our brothers too, or have you forgotten? As Christians, we must forgive those who trespass against us. We must forgive, we must assist, and we must _heal_. That's all I'm trying to do here, Abby. _Heal_. Now would you clean up that mess?" She gestured at the spilled antiseptic and Nick's blood.

Once again, Abby begrudgingly nodded and went to work on the floor, scrubbing and mopping.

Eve continued as she bandaged Nick's battered hand. "Luke is eighteen, remember? He's graduating this year. He got accepted at Rice and Houston Baptist University. He has a future. And Matthew is in law enforcement. Dad's a judge. Mom's a lawyer. What good would confessing do us, Abigail? All it would be is airing our dirty laundry for everyone in the city to see. Mom and Dad's reputations would suffer, but they'd fight to get Matt and Luke off anyway, regardless of what they did. Because Matt can do no wrong in Dad's eyes. Don't make our parents choose between their children. Because if it comes to picking between a son who's a cop, and a son who's gay, I don't think you need to imagine who our parents would side with. Nick needs help, and exposing his shameful secret is not the way to get that. We can help him. We will."

Abby's scrubbing on the floor intensified until all the blood was gone. "It's _wrong_, Eve."

"It's the right thing to do..." Eve muttered, like a mantra, as if she was trying to reassure herself.

The front door opened and closed and Abby stiffened, seizing the evidence and tossing it in the trash. They heard calls from the entry hall.

"Hello! Anybody here?"

"In the kitchen!" Eve called.

The approaching footsteps made Nick tense. He was frightened of how his parents would react, and if Eve's lie would really work. After all, their parents were both trained in a profession that determined truth from falsehood.

"Oh my goodness, Nick!" his mother exclaimed. "What happened to you?!"

"It's my fault," Eve told them, and the expression on her face helped in making her look guilty.

"What?" Mr. Stokes cried. "What are you talking about, Eve?" He kneeled down next to Nick and lightly stroked his hair. "What happened, Poncho?"

Nick looked to Eve for support. She answered for him. "I sent him on some errands, to go pick up the dry cleaning. I thought it wouldn't be that hard, it's not that far from the house. But he was mugged on his way there. They took all the money I'd given him, and left him like this. I take full responsibility."

"Well, did you see who attacked you, son?" Mr. Stokes asked.

"We can report it," Mrs. Stokes chimed in. "I swear, whoever hurt my baby..."

"No," Nick mumbled, his eyes cast downward. "It was dark. They were wearing masks. I'm sorry."

"Sweetheart, you have nothing to apologize for," Mrs. Stokes cooed, pushing Eve out of the way as she kneeled down in front of Nick. "This wasn't your fault."

"No, it wasn't," Mr. Stokes growled. "But we'll find the suckers who _did_ do it. Are you sure you didn't get a good look at 'em?"

"No, but I did," Abby chimed in, drawing the attention of their parents. Eve glared at her.

"You were with him?" Mrs. Stokes asked.

"No, she wasn't," Eve snapped, curtly. "She's just been playing detective work. But I don't want anyone's reputations to get smeared."

"But I—"

"Now isn't the time for your silly theories, Abby," Eve hissed.

Abby's lower lip trembled, her eyes wide with unshed tears, but she said nothing as she darted out of the room and ran up the stairs.

"What was that about?" Mr. Stokes asked Eve.

"Nothing, she's just throwing another one of her tantrums," Eve muttered.

"You did good, kiddo," Mr. Stokes told Nick fondly as he smiled at his youngest son reassuringly. "You don't look so bad. It looks like you held your own, I bet! You're a fighter, I know you are."

Nick's eyes fell to the floor. He felt lower than worms beneath the soil. "I'm so sorry, Cisco," he managed to say without bursting into uncontrollable sobs.

His father's fond smile grew as he tousled Nick's hair, making Nick wish that everyone would just stop doing that. "You were brave, son. That's all I could ask for."

His mother kissed him lightly on the temple, avoiding his bruises carefully. "We love you always, Nicky," she whispered.

Nick closed his eyes so the tears wouldn't fall. He heard his parents' footsteps exit, leaving him and Eve alone. She crouched down in front of him again and continued to clean him up in silence. Finally, she began speaking again, in hushed tones. But Nick really wished she would stop.

"You have to understand, Nicky," she whispered, as if afraid that their parents or someone else would hear. "It's essential that you understand. Do you?"

Nick nodded, but it was a lie.

She could tell. "You don't, and that's the problem," she whispered, dabbing at a cut on his forehead. "It's not that we don't love you. It's not that Matt and Luke don't love you. On the contrary, we love you to death. We would do anything to protect, to help you, to save you. That's what we're doing, Nicky. Saving you. What Matt did... it's not the way I would have done things. It was brash, it was irrational, but maybe, just maybe, it did the trick. You won't do that again, will you, Nicky? Now that you know that it's wrong. That it's unnatural. It's not normal, Nicky. And if you do it, then you'll get diseases. Bad ones. You know that disease, the one you keep hearing on the news? AIDS? It's God's way of reminding us that being gay isn't right."

"But Reagan says—"

"No, Nicky, it's real, and it can kill you," Eve said sharply. "I don't want you to die. I love you. This is the right thing to do. Remember when I said I would protect you? Well, I'm doing that. You may be confused, you may hurt, but believe me when I tell you I am saving you a _lot_ of grief in the future. You'll thank me someday, when you're married to a nice, lovely girl, with kids, and you'll know that I did this for you." She finished cleaning Nick up and beamed at him, brushing her hands across his shoulders and straightening out his shirt. "Now. Tomorrow, we'll be going to church. If you want, if you still feel like you're having these... urges... we will talk to Father Miller about this, and he'll help us."

"No," Nick said sharply, shaking his head. "No, I don't want to. I'll be good, Evey."

Eve's smile grew as she cupped Nick's swollen face in her hands. "God is challenging you, Nicky. You can beat this, I know you can. You're strong and brave, and Dad's right. You're a fighter. It's a good thing you have a family like us, to help you through these hard times. This is the best thing for us, Nicky—" A thought seemed to occur to her and she swallowed. "Nick. You'll just have to trust me. You trust me, don't you Nick?"

Nick nodded, lying again.

"Good boy," she whispered, rising to her feet. "Why don't you go upstairs and rest a while?"

Feeling numb, Nick walked through the living room and up the stairs like a zombie. He had no thoughts, and all of his emotions were pushed to the back of his mind. He tried and failed to understand what he had done wrong. He felt dirty and disgusting, and it made his stomach churn all over again. On his way to his room, he passed Abby's, and her door was open as she scribbled viciously in a book as she lay on her bed. Nick hesitated outside her door, watching her momentarily. She felt his gaze and looked up. Their eyes connected. Like a ghost, Nick drifted into her room, closing the door behind him as he continued to stare at her, wanting to ask her all the questions that continued to swirl in his head. He felt the tears again, a new wave of emotion over coming him and he strode quickly to Abby's bed, where his sister waited with open arms. He climbed up onto it and allowed her to embrace him, cradling his head in her lap as he clutched desperately at her comforter. She stroked his hair softly as he cried.

The next day, the Stokes family went to church, just like they did every Sunday. They filed into the pews and Nick kept his head low as Abby held his hand. Matt stood on his other side and when Nick glanced at him, his oldest brother smiled down at him, as if nothing had ever happened. People asked about Nick's appearance, and his father told the gallant story of how Nick stood up to a gang of muggers, and even managed to send a few running home. His father didn't know exactly how much of an exaggeration that story really was. But the proud look on his face made Nick averse to correcting him.

And he never would correct him.

He would never kiss another man like that again. No matter how much he wanted to. No matter how head-over-heals in love he was. Because a man was supposed to be with a woman, and have children, and Nick needed that. He needed to get married, so he could finally understand what his sister had meant when they had sat in that kitchen together in 1986.

That Sunday, Tony Palmer fell into a coma.

He never woke up.


	4. The Lion And The Lamb Pt 1

**Part 3.1: The Lion and the Lamb**

_**Author's Note:**_ As you can tell be the title, part three got split in half as well. I'm hoping to keep part four in one piece. Enjoy the first half of part three.

* * *

"The wolf and the lamb shall feed together, and the lion shall eat straw like the bullock: and dust shall be the serpent's meat. They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain, saith the LORD."-- **Isaiah 65:25**

* * *

_"Eve, you can't do this, you're our last chance."_

_"I'm sorry, Mom, but I completely forgot! She's turning twenty-one, and you know what will happen if I'm not there to drive people home!"_

_"Eve, you promised. It's just Nick! What with Abby spending the night at Carolyn's, and Luke away at camp—"_

_"Here... Here. This is the number of the woman Sheryl gets to babysit her little sister. Sheryl says she's great."_

_"I don't like leaving Nicky with strangers..."_

_"She's not a stranger, Mom, she babysits Linda Spinelli. And you've known her sister Sheryl for years. Sheryl's my best friend, she wouldn't steer me wrong on this."_

_"I'll do it if it's alright with Nick. Are you OK with this, honey?"_

_"What about Matt? Can't Matt watch me?"_

_"He's at a graduation party, sweetheart. I couldn't ask him to come home just to watch you."_

_"Judy or Becky—"_

_"Judy is at Shauna's studying for her exam tomorrow, and Becky is far too young to look after you, even if she wasn't at camp."_

_"Fine then... whatever."_

_"Don't be mad at me, Nick, you may like her."_

_"It's just... you said it was up to me..."_

_"Well, I have no other choice."_

_"Nick, don't give Mom any trouble."_

_"Shut up, Eve."_

ooo

The night before Greg showed up at my apartment unwelcome and unannounced, I had the Nightmare again. A few nights, directly after it happened, when my parents were still staying in my home, I dreamed that I was back underground again, and that the whole rescue had been some cosmic joke on my very strung-out brain. For days afterward, I didn't even believe I was really alive. My parents helped to remind me that I was, filling me in on minute and pointless details about my siblings, some I cared to know and others I didn't. It helped me reconnect with reality. But after they left for Texas, I lost that connection. I wrapped the comforter around myself in bed and pretended it was a cocoon.

And then I had the Nightmare.

This wasn't the same dreams I'd been having about the box. This was a dream that hadn't plagued me for over twenty years. The last time it struck me was after Tony's death. The fact that it was pouncing on me now, when I was at my lowest point in twenty years, proved that it was permanently a part of me. I have had to come to terms with a lot of trauma in my life. Some would say I'm unlucky, but my father would say I'm resilient. That's what he said when I returned home from the hospital and asked him why God would put me through all of these things if I was a good person. He compared me to Job, and said that God trusted that I was strong enough to endure these trials. Then again, my father doesn't know everything I've been through. But when I think about it all, maybe he's right.

But I am not Job. My faith isn't half as strong as his. I've doubted the worth of believing in a God who feels it necessary to test your faith. It's almost like a jealous lover who dangles temptation in front of you just so they can say I-told-you-so when you stray. But like Job, I have constantly appealed to something, anything that will listen, for answers. And all that greets my ears and mind is silence.

It was the Nightmare that put me in such an agitated mood that day when Greg arrived. I couldn't get her face, her voice, her words out of my head. Of all the demons I have met in my life, she by far is the worst. Nigel Crane, Walter Gordon, even my own brother Matthew can't compare to her. Because she was the first. She was the one who reached into my chest with her scalding claws and stole my childhood, leaving a scar a mile long, but no one ever saw.

It was all too much, really. The Nightmare, Tony, being buried, all of it swirling inside of my head. I felt as if a thousand angry voices were screaming at me and I just wanted everyone to be quiet. I called Abby, because I had heard from all my other siblings after I returned from the hospital, including Luke, but I hadn't heard from her. And my sister didn't answer her phone.

Dwelling alone in my self-imposed prison of an apartment, I paced back and forth constantly, impatiently, considering maybe daring to step foot out in the sunlight, take a walk, meet up with a friend, but I always chickened out. I drank a lot, but no more than was unusual for a man who'd just gone through a traumatic experience. I left a voicemail on Abby's machine, but she never called back.

Eventually, I rifled through my stuff, and pulled out Tony's old copy of _The Catcher In The Rye_. Although a bitter memory, there was a certain sweetness to it as well, when I remembered the boy who inspired such epiphanies in me, about life and literature. It was a much safer memory to focus on, better than the Nightmare, and better than being buried. The pages of the tattered novel were yellow and smelled of damp paper, and the ink from the notes Tony had made had faded over the years. I ran my fingers over them and closed my eyes, trying to pull some sense of him from the pages, reminding myself that he had read this book, that he had _loved_ this book, and that he had wanted to share it with me. My fingertips reverently stroked the text, like a blind man reading Braille; only I found no solace within those pages, only a deepening rage. It was a rage that had been building inside of me ever since Matthew threw that first punch. Ever since Eve first told me that she wanted to save me. Ever since Luke called me a "fucking queer." And it grew, every time I chastised myself for imagining a fraternity brother, or a friend, or a colleague in a less-than-decent situation. It swelled every time I repeated that mantra to myself, _I'm not gay. I'm not GAY! I'm not gay..._

And in the middle of all of this, all of my pensive, meticulous methods of dealing with what happened to me, someone had the audacity to knock loudly on my door.

... I hadn't meant to hurt him. Honest.

I knew he wouldn't go away, so I had to get up and unchain the door. I grabbed my beer and returned to the couch, where _Catcher_ awaited me. I tried to ignore him, but I knew it would do no good. He stared at me for a long time, until I couldn't stand his scrutiny, and burst out, rather gruffly, "What do you want?"

The whole affair pretty much snowballed from there. I recognized the attempts on his part to get close to me, to break down my walls, to figure out what part of me was broken so he could reach inside and tinker with it, probably with the intention of fixing it, but whenever someone tinkered with me, they only made things worse. So of course, I couldn't let that happen. If I let my guard down for even a second, then he would know, he would _know_, I'm _sure_, in that peculiar, all-knowing way of his, every secret I ever hid from the world. I knew with all my heart that Greg Sanders could see right through me. Sometimes, it was a relief, and others it was absolutely petrifying. Now, it was just a disaster.

I tried everything I could to make him leave. I tried to focus on Tony's notes in the novel. The passages he underlined. The way he formed his A's and the curls he added to the tails of his Y's... _Phoebe is the only person Holden really cares about_, he wrote in the margin by the scene towards the end of the novel. _Because she represents everything he used to be, everything he can't go back to._

"Have you read it before?"

_A thousand times a year, I read it._

"Would you please _talk_ to me, Nick?"

"I have nothing to say." It was the truth. "Now shut up. Holden is talking to his sister. I love this part." _Tony loved this part, too. You can tell because it's the most commented on passage in the entire novel._

That's when Greg finally got angry. Apparently, all of my hiding had finally gotten under his skin and he exploded. He grasped at straws, trying to connect with me, and I threw it back in his face. I didn't want him there. What right did he have to be here, trying to relate to me and the monsters in my head? I tried not to feel anything when he told me what it was like for the others, watching me in that box. When I found out there was a camera, it made my skin crawl. They had been watching me the whole time. If I'd have shot myself, at any point in there, they would have seen it. It was too much, and I hated thinking about it. I didn't want him to see how it affected me. I tried to laugh; I tried to appear cold and calloused so maybe he wouldn't care about me so much anymore. If I was cruel enough, maybe he would give up.

"I hate it when you're angry, Nick! It scares the hell out of me."

I scared him. This beautiful, naive boy that made my head spin whenever he was near, that made my throat constrict, that made me feel that all my walls were made of glass... I scared him.

Perhaps cruelty was the wrong way to go. "You shouldn't see me angry." He didn't deserve to be scared. He didn't deserve so many things...

"I miss you… Please, Nicky… I want…" I looked up at him, but his eyes were focused elsewhere. _What do you want, Greg?_ "I want my best friend back."

Well, it was a start.

_No, what are you thinking?_ I snapped at myself. _What would Eve say?_ I chewed on my lip, the confession waiting at the back of my throat to pounce on him, but I wouldn't let it escape my lips, not now, not ever. So I took the confession, I molded it like a ball of clay, into an excuse instead. "I was… raised to believe that men aren't…" The words died in my throat. If I told him what men aren't supposed to do, my feelings would be transparent. He would know. And he could never know. "I don't want to talk about it."

And then, we were right back to where we started. Him, demanding what was wrong. Me, refusing to acknowledge him. I returned to the sanctuary of my novel, my eyes glossing over Tony's notes more than the actual text. Since outright ignoring him hadn't worked last time, I kept my responses to his incessant questions short and brief. I needed him to leave. The longer he stayed, the faster the ice in my lungs melted, and my walls began to crumble. And he could never see me that way.

"What are you so afraid of? Why won't you talk to me?"

The answer to that question was far too ineffable to put into words. "I just don't…" I drifted into a reverie, then. Greg didn't know how lucky he was, to have things that made him smile constantly, through anything. He didn't understand that he was speaking with a man plagued by Satan at God's allowance. He didn't know the toll that had been taken from me, and I hoped he never would. I wanted to protect him from that. I _needed_ to _keep_ him from that. Satan could have me, but Greg's soul would be forever his own and no one else's.

"You wish you could catch them."

I was startled from my thoughts, wondering momentarily if he had telepathically read them. "What?"

He sat down on the couch, and in that moment I was horrified that he already knew. I moved away from him, to protect the both of us. His eyes never left me, and I found it too disconcerting. "The children. You want to save them from tumbling over the cliff. Just like Holden. You want to catch them."

_No,_ I thought, _I want to catch you._ "What children?"

"I've seen you on cases with kids."

"The cliff is a metaphor for growing up, Greg, not dying."

"What's the difference? The cliff is the end of innocence, and those children that we see have had their innocence stolen from them all the same."

_Oh God, Oh God, Oh God, he knows!_ I wasn't sure _how_, exactly, but he knew everything, I could tell. This was very bad. A moment longer, and I would be dead. "I think you should leave, Greg."

"So you've said, but I'm not going to."

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. He couldn't stay. And I couldn't be accountable for my actions if he did. "It really would be better for the both of us if you just left right now." My knuckles whitened as they clenched the book.

"I want to know why you're so angry all the time."

He moved closer to me on the couch, but I was frozen to the spot. I stared at him in horror and the strangest need came over me. A part of me wanted him there. A part of me needed to feel his touch, to remind me of what it was like to _be_ touched by someone so gentle and yet so strong. I saw Tony's eyes reflected in his and I wanted them, I needed them.

"Nick... Please..."

_He's touching my knee, oh _God, _he's touching my _knee!

That's where the fire began, and its flames licked my skin, setting everything on fire, burning down my walls, and I thought, _If he knows, and he hasn't run away yet, what's the harm? How bad could it be?_

I turned towards him and reached out, desperate to connect with another human being, and Greg seemed to know me so well. I wanted to know him, really _know_ him, Biblically _know_ him... My hand cupped the back of his neck and I could feel something stir inside me, an old, ragged cat that had been curled up asleep in my gut for twenty years was finally aroused and it stretched and purred and egged me on...

Until Matt's voice penetrated my thoughts. "_It's a shame that faggotry isn't a crime in these United States. If I had my way, there'd only be steers in Texas... That sort of thing can't be tolerated in this family._"

My eyes snapped open and it wasn't Greg in my hands, but my older brother. My fingers tightened at the back of his neck and some soft lamb cried out at the sight of the slaughterhouse.

_This is dirty, you're dirty, he's dirty, you need to purge yourself and him of this sin._

In that moment, I was possessed. The rage that had culminated inside of me all of these years, Matthew's face, Eve's voice, Luke's fists, it all exploded out of me at once, and finally I could stand up for myself. I wasn't the youngest brother anymore, I wasn't the sweet little lamb that could be easily molded and manipulated, and _finally_ I could fight back, I could beat them, I could beat them all and I would _win_, I would beat them all to death and I would do it over and over again—

Until the lamb's bleats were finally translated inside my scrambled skull.

"_Nick, stop! Please! I'm sorry, I'm so fucking sorry, stop it, please! I didn't mean to piss you off, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, it was stupid, I'll never do it again, I swear, I swear to God, I'll leave you alone, you'll never see me again, just please, Nick, stop, stop..._"

And I did. His voice had broken the spell and I understood that he was not who I thought he was. This was the man I had wanted to protect, the man I would have given anything to see safe and sweet and... and _innocent_ forever, and I had just beaten him as brutally as my own brothers had beat me, for a crime he didn't even commit. I leapt off of him then and backed away, unable to draw my attention away from his bruised and swelling body.

He continued to babble, as if he hadn't noticed that I had relented. I wanted to tell him to stop, feeling the nausea flood my stomach with bile, and it rose up in my throat. "_I didn't mean it, it was a lie, I don't know what I was doing, I'll leave you alone, I'll do anything, please, Nick, I'm so fucking sorry..._"

At last he seemed to recognize that there was a change, his voice trailing away into desperate gasps for air, like a half-drowned man. He moved his arms down from his face and lifted his lids, dark eyes staring at me in bafflement and a fear that I never wanted to see in them. I couldn't stand it, and I couldn't suppress the vomit and revulsion that leapt into my mouth and I ran from the room, just abandoning him there.

I locked myself in the bathroom, gripping the cold porcelain edges of the toilet as I heaved. I contemplated going back out there, helping him to his feet, maybe offering to take him to the hospital. Apologize.

But how do you apologize for that?

And anyway, he probably didn't want to see me. He was terrified of me now, and he always would be. _What have you done?! What the fuck is the matter with you?_

I splashed water on my face in the sink and looked up at my sallow complexion. I was trembling, and was surprised that I wanted someone to comfort me and tell me that everything was all OK. I wanted to go outside and spill my guts to Greg, explain why, explain what I saw and heard, confess _everything_...

But by the time I finally worked up the courage to return to the living room, he was gone.

That's when I knew I needed to change. I ran back into the bathroom and peeled off my sweaty clothes that I had been wearing for days. I hopped into the shower and began to scrub madly until my skin was raw. Afterwards, I seized my razor and attacked the growth on my face. I cut myself a few times, which is something I haven't done shaving since I was a teenager. But they healed quickly enough. Maybe it's odd, that my reaction to what happened was to clean myself, as if a simple shower could wash away all my guilt.

It didn't.

ooo

_"Mr. and Mrs. Stokes? I'm Nancy Hart."_

_"Hello, Nancy! Thank you for coming on such short notice. Now, we shouldn't be gone long. We'll be back by __eleven o'clock__ at the latest. Emergency numbers are on the fridge if you need anything. Nick needs to be in bed by nine, and he needs a bath, and don't let him make a fuss about it! He hates baths, so it may take some doing. If he gives you any trouble, which he shouldn't because he's an angel, then just let me know."_

_"Yes, Mrs. Stokes."_

_"Nicky, say hi to Ms. Hart."_

_"Hi."_

_"Hi, what, Nicky?"_

_"Hi, Ms. Hart."_

_"You can call me Nancy."_

_"There. I'll leave you two to get better acquainted. Nicky, be good for Nancy while we're gone. Treat her like you would your big sister, alright? She's in charge."_

_"Yes, Mom."_

_"Goodbye you two!"_

_Doors closed. Twin black eyes focused on him. "Hey Nicky. Wanna play a game?" _

ooo

I couldn't even look at him the next day. And yet, he seemed to be everywhere I went. When he entered the break room, I thought I was going to get a whooping from Sara after Greg told her what happened. But when he spoke, his voice was jovial. It was proud, even, as he told some bullshit story about beating a guy up in a bar. He was so convincing, it made me wonder what else he'd lied about that I never noticed before. Sara definitely bought it, and who wouldn't? The lie was solid, and it was _much_ better than the abused spouse's "I ran into a door" excuse. Greg admitted to a fight—he just lied about who it was with.

I wasn't sure why. Maybe he was embarrassed, or ashamed that he'd let me do that to him. Maybe he made up the story because he _wished_ he'd fought back. A part of me wondered why he didn't. Greg wasn't strong, but he was by no means weak. Maybe he couldn't match me in muscle, but he should have definitely tried to. All he did was shield himself from my blows. Was he afraid to strike back?

I avoided being with him alone for as long as I was able, but when we were in crowds, I lied as fluidly as he did. I laughed, told jokes, drank coffee, had fun... At the diner, one day, I even sat next to him in a booth.

He shifted as I did so, and I almost regretted it, but I looked at his face and saw he was staring at Sara with bright eyes and a smile. Still, his arms folded across his chest and he moved towards the window, as if I had trapped him there. He could lie with his face and his words, but his body betrayed him. At least, this time.

Warrick swiftly engaged me in conversation and I turned my attention to him. Eventually, Greg relaxed beside me. A while into the evening, he sank back into the bench, his arms rubbing his belly as he voiced his appreciation for the meal.

Our shoulders touched.

I don't know if he felt it, but I definitely did. My senses were automatically tuned to that small area where Greg's shoulder pressed against mine through our T-shirts. My breathing grew deeper as I silently panicked. I dared to glance at him, but he was staring at his plate and talking, saying words I couldn't decipher because my mind was too preoccupied with the warm place where we were connected.

And then, just as suddenly, he shifted again, leaning in towards his table to grab his coffee and make a corny joke at Sara, who rolled her eyes.

Soon enough, I was swept away in the conversation again. And then I was caught by surprise when Greg addressed me directly.

"You gonna eat that?"

I looked to where his finger was pointing, the roll on my bread plate. My gaze traveled to meet his, which was questioning, his eyebrows raised as he waited for my answer.

"I thought you were full," I said, forcing a half-smile.

"I'm hungry again," Greg returned, mirroring my expression.

"How many stomachs do you _have_, man?" I laughed playfully.

"Four," he replied. "I'm secretly a cow."

"No secret about it," I muttered.

"Oh, _I'm_ the cow?" Greg returned, his smile broadening. "You just had a stack of pancakes, a side of French toast _and_ two eggs and bacon. So who's the pot and who's the kettle here, Mr. Stokes?"

"Oh, shut up," I laughed, hitting him lightly in the arm.

I knew it was a mistake the second I did it because his smile faltered a quarter of an inch. No one else caught it, and I probably wouldn't have if I hadn't been paying attention, but I did. My smile dissolved completely, and I hoped he saw the regret evident in my eyes.

But as he refortified his mask, he hit me back. "You shut up," he returned, before snatching the roll off my plate and shoving it into his mouth whole, glaring at me playfully as if proving a point.

My own expression of amusement warily returned and I shook my head at him. "You're disgusting," I said.

We were two great pretenders in a world that thrived on laughter. So we laughed, like a pair of awkward hyenas in a human environment.

I looked for _The Catcher In The Rye_ that night, absolutely certain it had to be in my living room somewhere, because that's where I'd left it. And I desperately needed the comfort of Tony's boyish scrawl. I wanted to read about Holden and Mr. Antolini and Phoebe. I needed that novel, like a security blanket. I checked over by the couch, but it wasn't there. I looked on and under the coffee table, but it wasn't there either. I felt between the cushions of the couch, under the couch, shuffled magazines around, checked every single one of my bookcases, but it wasn't in any of those places.

I began to panic. Where had I put it? Where the _fuck_ had I put it?

Chills running down my spine, hoping I hadn't accidentally thrown it into the recycling with yesterday's paper, I began the chaotic process of tearing my perfectly well-managed apartment apart. Pillows were tossed into the air, books were thrown from shelves, hell my TV almost ended up sailing out the window.

Finally, in one desperate, last ditch attempt to recover my sanctuary, I threw open my front door and hurtled down the stairs to see if I could sort through the recycling and find it with the newspaper...

Only I was too late. The recycling had already been picked up.

That was it. It was all over. I had lost him, I had lost that last piece of Tony that had been alive all these years. He was finally dead, and the part of him in me decomposed, the worms wriggling in and out of his carcass and burrowing their way into my rapidly shriveling heart.

ooo

_"What game?"_

_"It's a fun game. How about you go upstairs and get ready for your bath and I'll explain the game later, hm?"_

_"What's the game?"_

_"You'll see. I think you'll enjoy it. But you need to go up and take your bath first. Afterwards, I'll tell you what the game is."_

_"You don't need to treat me like a baby, I know what you're doing."_

_"Do you?"_

_"Yeah. You're tricking me."_

_"Why would I trick you, Nick? I'm here to take care of you."_

_"You're tricking me into taking a bath. My Mom told you how much I hate baths. I don't want to."_

_"Your mother also said to obey me, Nicky. And besides, this game _involves_ the bath."_

_"You mean like... rubber duckies? I have those already."_

_"No, more than that, you'll see."_

_Unfortunately, curiosity is the fatal sin of a child. "OK I guess... But you promise it will be fun?"_

_"Cross my heart, little guy."_

ooo

A little while later, when I thought things had calmed down a bit, I was washing my hands in the bathroom when I heard the door open and close, but no footsteps. I looked up in the mirror and saw Greg in its reflection, standing by the door watching me. I closed my eyes and sighed.

"Sorry, I'll be going..." I muttered.

He stepped in my path. "No, don't."

I offered my palms to him. "Listen... about what happened..."

"You're sorry, I know," Greg said abruptly, as if he didn't want to talk about it. "I get it."

"No, I don't think you do..."

"No, I get that you're sorry for hitting me. That makes sense. It's a natural response to what happened. But you're right, there are a few things that I _don't_ get that I would like to. Like..." He hesitated, and I saw him shake slightly on the spot, as if he was afraid to ask. "Like exactly _why_ you did it."

My eyes gravitated to the tile floor and I shoved my hands in my pockets. I felt my throat constrict again, the heat rising in my cheeks as sweat trickled in between the crevices of my fingers in my warm, tight jean pockets. I gritted my teeth, flashes of Matt and Luke's fists racing before my mind's eye, black eyes boring into my skull, and Abby _still_ hadn't called me back and what was Greg doing, asking me this? Didn't he know it was dangerous?

"Please, Greg, I don't want to talk about it."

"Nick..." His voice was rough, like sandpaper, his eyes dark as he continued to stare at me. "Something is _wrong_ with us. I think..." He paused. "I think maybe... it was something I did."

I looked up, my brow furrowing.

He continued, his words coming out so fast they nearly crashed into each other. "Something I did, or said maybe even, that you might have misheard or misinterpreted or whatever, I don't know, but I just wanted you to know that I didn't mean it, what you think I meant, I mean, I didn't, not really because I don't know what you thought I meant, I just know it was wrong, I mean, it _has_ to be wrong if it made you want to hit me, right, so just forget I said it or did it or whatever and can't we just be friends again please?"

I was stunned. He thought he'd done something wrong. Of course. That was typical, why hadn't I realized...

"No..."

"No... what?" Greg probed anxiously.

I couldn't think straight. "I can't... no, it wasn't you, Greg... I'm..." I closed my eyes tight, feeling the beginning of a headache. "I'm not..." I sighed. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have hit you. I wasn't myself. I kind of... freaked out about the whole being buried alive thing."

"No," Greg said adamantly. "It wasn't about that, I could tell. There's something else in you, too, Nick, something I can tell you want to talk about, but you never do and I don't know why."

I thought about running my hands through his curls, and the reproachful rage began to boil inside of me again until I didn't just want to caress his neck, I wanted to snap it in two. That's when I realized... there _was_ something wrong with me, something _terribly_ wrong, if I associated the urge to touch Greg with violence.

Still, the anger was bubbling in my stomach and I clenched my teeth. "Drop it."

"Nick, I can't." There was a slight tremor on the word "can't," as if he had tried previously and failed, miserably. As if he was completely unable to let this go. He was desperate, and he was crazy, and he wanted closure from me.

I couldn't give it to him. I pursed my lips and took deep breaths. The more I wanted to take him in my arms the more I wanted to hit him again, but I held myself back because I had the presence of mind this time to remind myself that this was _Greg_ I was dealing with, not Matthew or Luke or someone who deserved the consequences of my wrath. "Please, Greg, I'm asking you..."

"And I'm asking _you_!" There was no mistaking it, the tremor was there, his eyes glistening in the florescent light. "Tell me what's going on. I'm sorry, whatever I did, I—"

"Drop it, before I hit you again," I burst out, unintentionally.

His mouth snapped shut. He wrapped his arms around himself, that unspeakable fear present again in his eyes and he nodded quickly, curtly, before spinning around and walking out the door.

My knees went weak and I fell to the floor, the bottled fury dissipating slowly into my blood stream. Closing my eyes tight I heatedly banged the tile with my fist, sending shockwaves of pain through my fingers and wrist.

Greg had retreated when I warned him that I might hit him again. Because he knew it wasn't an empty threat. And that was the worst part of that conversation.


	5. The Lion And the Lamb Pt 2

**Part 3.2: The Lion and the Lamb**

_**Author's Note:**_ I crafted a video for this fic. It's been a while, and it was harder than my others. Copy and paste the following address, removing the space between . com, and replacing the bolded phrase in the middle with an equal sign: youtube. com/watch?v**(equal sign)**jjT8vOqBnHU

* * *

"I am the LORD thy God and thou shalt not have any strange gods before me."**-- Deuteronomy 5:6**

* * *

_Knocking. He wasn't ready._

_"Wait—"_

_"Hey, Nicky."_

_"I said _wait!" _Hands seized warm, fuzzy cotton cloth._

_"Oh, don't worry about it, I've seen worse. Why aren't you in the tub yet?"_

_"The water's not warm enough."_

_The tinkling sound of water. A hand pulled out._

_"Oh it's just fine. You'd rather have it be scalding?"_

_"I don't want to..."_

_"Take off the towel and get into the bath."_

_"It's not warm enough."_

_"Get into the bath, Nick, and I'll _make_ it warm enough."_

_"Do you mind... could you maybe leave... please?"_

_"Don't be silly, Nick—"_

_Hands stole his modesty and tossed it like a rag onto the floor. He was afraid. His face burned._

_"Bath, sweetheart."_

_Toe broke the surface of the lukewarm water. Foot plunged in. Other foot was drawn over the porcelain edge of the basin and landed next to the first. Slowly, he sat down, drawing his knees to his chest. The sound of the running tap, like waterfalls, provided a steady rhythm for his requiem._

_"What are you doing?"_

_"Getting the shampoo."_

_"I can do that... I'm not a baby, I told you."_

_"No, you're a big boy."_

_Hands again, two of them, pressed against his shoulders, drawing all of the warmth from him. They pushed him further down in the water. Held his head beneath the tap. He inhaled and kept the air inside his lungs, wondering if she would drown him._

_"I don't like this."_

_"Hush. I care about you, Nicky. Don't you trust me?"_

_The tragedy was that he did. "I can wash myself."_

_"This is all part of the game, Nick." _

ooo

About a year after I was buried, I woke up in a cold sweat. That on its own should have told me that it wasn't going to be a good day. But for the life of me, I couldn't remember the dream that put me in that state. So I swallowed my fear, made myself some coffee, and headed to work.

It had all started routinely enough. Grissom had a crime scene in a garage, and Warrick and I had one just off of the strip. Some tourist had been hurt pretty badly. Warrick wondered if our scene was related to Grissom's. At the time, I just thought it was a lead. I didn't imagine that this new crime spree would end up hurting Greg.

I know it was always difficult for Grissom to relay bad news, especially if it regarded someone on his team. I tried to remind myself of this when he told me what happened, considering it wasn't in the most considerate way. Warrick and I were chatting about our case in the break room over a cup of coffee as we waited for trace results on our evidence. Grissom entered, his eyes cast down on a file, his face oddly pale, but otherwise his expression was inscrutable. He stopped in the middle of the room and looked up at us, just staring momentarily with his mouth partially open, as if he had begun to speak and then suddenly stopped.

I cocked an eyebrow at him. "Griss?"

"I have a scene for you two."

"We just got back from a scene," Warrick reminded him, taking a sip of his coffee.

"Well, I need you to take this one," he insisted.

Warrick shrugged. "Alright, where is it?"

"An alley," Grissom explained. "Off of Duncan. Three... victims."

I didn't understand why he had hesitated on the word, but didn't dwell on it. It was not easy to tell when Grissom was unnerved. He often acted the same way when he was tired.

"419?" I asked.

"No," he said, his eyes widening slightly as though the thought of three dead bodies in an alley was unthinkable. "415... Possibly 415C, I'm not sure... All three victims are alive, but in critical condition."

"ID?" I asked, finishing the last of my coffee.

He spoke as if it were any other case, and the names held no significance. "Stanley Tanner, Demetrius James and Greg Sanders."

I blinked, then looked to Warrick to make sure I'd heard right. Warrick seemed unfazed as he continued to watch Grissom. He set down his coffee cup, then frowned, seemingly confused.

"Eerie, a vic with Greg's name..." Warrick commented slowly.

Grissom sighed. "It _is_ Greg, Warrick."

I tumbled down the rabbit hole and wondered if someone had slipped something into my coffee. The air around Grissom shimmered, and his voice held an ethereal quality as he explained. My body responded to my mental state, my heart rate increasing, throat constricting, face flushing, sweat beginning to materialize on my forehead and hands... I wondered if there was a fire in the very room I stood in, and if it was burning me alive.

"He was on his way to a scene and he witnessed the crime in progress. Dispatch told him to wait for backup, but by the time backup got there he was unconscious..."

_No._

I hadn't even realized I'd spoken out loud until I noticed both Grissom and Warrick's eyes on me. I blinked and swallowed to open my throat, my hand rising to wipe the sweat from my brow as I consciously tried to lower my heart rate. I took a deep breath.

"I mean..." And then, I laughed, to dispel the tension. "If it were really Greg, you wouldn't have told us like this, would you?"

There was a subtle change to Grissom's otherwise unreadable expression as his features softened. "I need at least two CSIs at the scene."

"Where is he?" I demanded.

"You can see him after the job is done," Grissom assured me. "Sara's with him now. She won't leave his side."

_She's a better friend than me anyways,_ I thought.

ooo

_"I don't think I like this game..."_

_Unwelcome hands lathered a soapy substance into his hair. His eyes snapped shut. Cold hands descended, rubbing behind his ears, trailing shampoo down his cheeks, his neck, his shoulders..._

_Without warning, he was pushed under the water again, with very little breath in his lungs and he adjusted as quickly as he knew how as the hands rubbed his hair, clawing at his scalp until his head felt raw. Water, for minutes, then sweet, cool air, rushing into his gasping lungs._

_"There we go..."_

_"Please, stop..."_

_"Aren't you having fun, Nick?"_

_"No."_

_"Well, your mother did say you hated baths."_

_Hands on his shoulders, making tiny circles with soap. Moving down each of his arms. Grasping his knees, pressing them down, forcing them away from his chest, until he was fully exposed again. Hands roamed his chest, working up a foamy lather._

_"You're shaking."_

_"Water's... c-c-cold..."_

_"Poor baby." But she did nothing to solve the problem._

_Hands moved downward, scrubbing his belly button. His legs curled instinctively, but she pushed them._

_"W-what are y-you d-doing?"_

_"I'm washing you, baby."_

_"I'm n-n-not a b-baby."_

_"No, you're a big boy."_

_Hands on his hips, moving further still. The water froze, ice trapping him in place and his stomach spasmed. Hands clutched him, and he didn't understand. It didn't feel right. She wasn't supposed to do that. He closed his eyes, the tears leaking painfully down his cheeks as his body reflexively tensed. He didn't like this game._

_"Stop it."_

_"We're just getting started."_

"Stop it."

_"Not yet..."_

_Hands moved back and forth, making him ill. Hands in his hair. Body leaning over tub. Hands pulling him towards her, pressing him against her chest. He closed his eyes, he pretended it was a dream, and when he awoke he could hide in his parents' bed. But hands... hands were everywhere. His trembling intensified and he let out a sob._

_"S'not r-r-right..." Tears splashed into the water._

_"Hush, baby."_

_"N-n-not a..."_

_Hands... Hands where they weren't supposed to be. Hands that wouldn't leave._

_Body moved away. Hands traveled up again, cupping his cheeks. Lips pressed against him, but not in the same way his mother's did. Tongue moved into his mouth and he nearly choked on it. Who did this? Why? It was disgusting._

_This was not his first kiss._

_Kisses were warm and exciting, like the first day of summer when school is out, and all the flowers are blooming and the ice cream truck is in the neighborhood and every day is spent at the pool. Kisses are soft and comforting, like a mother's arms after you fell down and scraped your knee. Kisses are sweet and tender, like the way your friend's fingers feel when his hand is interlaced with yours._

_This was not a kiss._

_Body leaned back, hands retreated, pulling the plug in the bathtub. He drew his knees to his chest again, his eyes dry, cold like his slippery skin. He listened the gurgling sound of the draining water, felt the water level dropping._

_A towel landed in his lap. "There, all clean."_

_But he didn't feel clean._

ooo

I saw him through the glass and he was asleep. So was she. Slumped over his bed like an exhausted rag doll, her face pale, her back rising and falling. She held a book, half-open in her hands, her breathing fluttering the pages.

He looked worse than I imagined he would. His head was swollen and wrapped in bandages, his arms were sickly blues, yellows and purples... I was grateful that the rest of his body was hidden beneath the hospital covers. My hand gripped the doorknob, but I found I couldn't go in. Something sharp and rigid shot through me, telling me that it was a terrible idea. There was no possible way I could set foot in that room. What if Greg woke up and saw me? After what he went through, I was probably the last person in the world he wanted to wake up to.

My body tensed as if I had been struck by a bullet, and my eyes stung as the acidic tears leaked from them. I leaned my forehead against the door and took deep breaths. I had failed him. I was supposed to protect him, to save him, to catch him from falling off the cliff so he could stay and play in the rye forever. This... tender person, this quirky, cheerful lamb, had suffered the consequences of my sins. If I'd have known that he would be the price of my transgressions, that he would have to be my sacrifice...

I should have never let my guard down at all. The moment I did, it all came flooding out in the form of raging fists. He shouldn't have even been at my apartment in the first place. He should have never cared. I shouldn't have done anything to _make_ him care. And I shouldn't care for him either.

I might as well have pushed him off that fucking cliff myself.

I clenched my hands into fists to dispel my frustrations and ran them through my hair. I took a step back and looked in on him again. Sara's fingers unfurled and the book tumbled free of her hand and crashed to the floor. I was just about to leave when I noticed the title, with a jarring electric shock.

_The Catcher In The Rye._

I knew that faded lettering anywhere. That worn paper cover with the torn corners. The worn edges of the spine, where the glossy coat had chipped away, leaving behind yellow paper. That wasn't just _any_ copy of _The Catcher In The Rye._ It was _my_ copy. Forgetting that they were both asleep, I tore the door open and marched into the room, startling Sara from her slumber, though Greg did not move.

"Nick!" Sara whispered, surprised. "What's wrong?"

"Where did you get that?" I demanded of her with gritted teeth, my temper flaring.

She seemed stunned, then glanced at Greg. "It's part of his personal effects. They found it next to his cell phone in the car."

My fury subsided like the tide, taking my coloring with it. "What?" Suddenly, I couldn't stand. I gripped the side of Greg's hospital bed for stability. I'd thought I'd lost that book a year ago, and yet, here it was in Sara's ivory hands, and _she_ claimed she had taken it from Greg.

"He made very detailed notes, didn't he?" Sara asked quietly.

"Hm?" I asked, nervously. _How did she know about Tony?_

She smiled. "Greg," she explained, then handed me the book. "There's something written on pretty much every page."

My hands were shaking as I clutched my old heartache. My mouth went dry as I stared at the aged cover. A year ago, I thought I would never see this book again, and yet here I was, standing in Greg's hospital room, holding it in my hands. I felt as if I had just discovered the Holy Grail. My hands trembling, I slowly opened it to the first page of chapter one. My eyes scanned the words that were so familiar to me, they were like my own thoughts.

_If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you'll probably want to know is where I was born, and what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don't feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth—_

"Have you read it before?" Sara startled me from my familiar reverie.

I looked up. If only she knew. "Yeah... yeah, I've read it before."

She turned and smiled at Greg. "I didn't know he read much, but I guess that's his absolute favorite."

"Why was it with him?" I asked, as if she could provide all the answers.

She shrugged. "You'll have to ask him."

I turned to my injured friend then, listening as the ventilator expanded and contracted. I could not stay in this place. I refused to pour salt on his old wounds. A man who has just been beaten close to death does not want to wake up to the man that beat him a year earlier.

A strange, eerie feeling washed over me, and the lights went out. Sara was gone, and all I could hear was the ventilator as I stared at the man in that bed. I couldn't recognize his face because it was so badly disfigured, and the lack of light definitely didn't aid matters. He was smaller than I remembered Greg looking, and his hair seemed... longer, straighter. I took a step closer and the figure stirred, turning to me and opening his eyes and I stared into murky brown puddles. They were not Greg's eyes.

His mouth didn't move, but his voice echoed in the room. "_You did this to us._"

"Nick?"

The lights flashed on and Sara was there, a warmth returning to the room and Greg was still asleep, his eyes closed. I realized that something was gripping my arm and I turned to see it was Sara. Her eyes darted over the surface of my body, and her brow wrinkled slightly.

"You're shaking."

I looked down and noticed she was right. I laughed out of the sheer need of it, at the ridiculousness of this situation. I pulled my arm away from her and folded them across my chest.

"I'll be fine."

"You're really clammy—"

"I just have a bug is all," I explained, "which means I probably shouldn't be here." I nodded at Greg. "Infection and all."

I turned to leave but her voice alone restrained me. "Nick..."

It was yearning for understanding, that same yearning I heard so many time in Greg's voice and I closed my eyes, mentally untying the knots of her concern, which bound me to the spot. "I have evidence to process," I whispered and was gone.

ooo

_Slam. Click. The door was secure._

_Bang. The window was closed._

_Flick. Yank. The lamps were off, his nightlights unplugged._

_He pulled the comforter from his bed and draped it across his shoulders like a cape, though he knew he was no superhero. He retreated to the corner, drawing security from the two walls and stared at the door, light crawling in beneath it, reminding him that he cannot lock out everything._

_But he could try._

_And he did try._

_He missed his mother's arms. He wanted her to come home. He wanted his father to tell him stories about cowboys and adventurers. He wanted Eve to sing him to sleep, stroking his hair. He wanted Matt to teach him how to play basketball. He wanted Abby... for someone he could talk to in their own, secret child language._

_He stared at the door for a long time. He wondered if he would have to grow up in that corner. Become a man. All by himself in his dark room, waiting for his family to come home and save him._

_He stared at the door for a long time._

_She didn't knock. Didn't ask. Didn't call his name. She was done with him._

_He stared at the door for a long time._

_He hugged his knees to his chest. Pulled the comforter tightly around him like a cocoon._

_He stared at the door for a long time._

_He heard voices and straightened. Footsteps coming up stairs. Shadows obstructed the light beneath the door._

_"Don't bother him, he's probably fast asleep by now."_

_"You're an angel for doing this, Nancy... How much do I owe you?"_

_"Oh, no charge, really. It was a pleasure."_

_"Well, I have to pay you something—"_

_"You're son is adorable, Mrs. Stokes. We had a lot of fun tonight. And plus, with all the good work you and your husband do, keeping rapists and murderers off the street... Consider this my thank you to you two wonderful people."_

_"That's very sweet, Nancy, but I can't _not _pay you..."_

_"I don't want your money. I insist."_

_"You are a saint, Nancy Hart."_

_"So they tell me..."_

_The footsteps moved away again and he stared at the door._

_He stared at the door for a long time._

ooo

It took me a long time to be able to work up the courage to go in and see Greg. I tried to look as non-menacing as I possibly could. Even as the elevator opened on his floor, I wasn't sure this was the best idea. I had no idea if Greg wanted to see me, let alone talk to me. I also had no idea how he was recovering, and whether or not I could stand to look at him. Whether or not I would see Tony staring back at me. But I needed to know a few things. I wanted my friend back. The zealous boy who used to shrug off bad days like water off a raincoat. The docile man who pursued me with Gandhian pleas in the face of my violent threats. And also, I needed to know why he was in possession of my novel.

I clutched the travel mug tightly in my hands, trying to draw some warmth from it. It was a humble peace offering that I hoped Greg appreciated. Though I wondered if he'd be pissed that I went looking for and subsequently found where he stashed his Blue Hawaiian in the break room...

Holding my breath, I swiftly opened the door without knocking. He had been staring out the window but his head jolted to see who had entered. There was absolutely no change in his vacant expression. I wondered what it would take to make him smile again.

I closed the door behind me and walked further into the room, closer to his bed. The swelling had gone down significantly, and the colors on his skin were slowly returning to normal. It bothered me to see the scattered scars across the surface of his wan skin, which was still tinged slightly purple. The bandage was still wrapped around his head. I held my breath and reminded myself not to panic.

"Brought you some coffee..." I muttered, not knowing what else to say.

He blinked at me a moment, like an animal that knew you were saying something but didn't understand it, before turning away to look out the window again. I wondered if he was doing it on purpose because he didn't want to deal with me, or if he was in a daze from his pain medication.

I cleared my throat, but he did not turn to face me again. "It's your favorite..." I told him. "I know they don't give you good coffee here, so I thought you might appreciate a little something from home."

I waited for him to respond, to ask me where I had procured his favorite brand of coffee. But he didn't move.

"I'm..." I felt this urge to apologize, even though I had already apologized for all the things I was sorry for.

_Hadn't I?_

"I'm sorry," I sighed. "But just... would you take the coffee please? I think it'll do you a world of good."

"What are you doing here, Nick?" His voice was flat, somewhat scratchy, and held no mirth to it. It made me want to claw my eyes out in an Oedipal fashion, as if this Greek tragedy was all my fault.

"I think there are a few things that we desperately need to sort out," I replied, relieved that I had managed to keep my voice steady.

He continued to stare out the window. "Why now?"

I suppose it was a valid question, but I didn't understand it. "Because... they need to be sorted out."

"They've been needing to be sorted out for over a year," Greg said quietly. "Why now?"

And there it goes, the guilt constricting like an anaconda around my throat. I swallowed to clear my airways. "Because I nearly lost you, Greg."

He gave out a morose chuckle, more like a snort, pushing the air out of his nostrils in disdain. "Like we nearly lost you?"

I had no response to that, except for the typical one. "I'm really sorry, Greg."

"You get it now, don't you?" Greg asked, his head pivoting to look at me, his eyes like needles. "How it feels. Not knowing if your friend will survive the night. Wanting to connect with him, wanting him to open up to you, but..." And an ironic smile graced his features. "Now, I get it too, Nick. For once in my life I finally understand you."

"What?"

"Black..." Greg continued, his eyes glazing over. "Darkness just... swallowing you and you can't find the light again. So you lock everything out and wonder what it was you did wrong to deserve the darkness... You lock it away, but you know if someone ever finds the key, they will let it out again, and it will flood the sky and it will consume you and your friends and everything..."

"Where did you find that copy of _The Catcher In The Rye?_"

He blinked and seemed to return to himself. "What?"

My eyes darted to an IV by his bed. "Morphine drip?"

Greg followed my gaze. "I'm just a little out of it, but I know what you're saying. Or... no, wait, no I don't. What are you saying?"

"_The Catcher In The Rye,_ Greg," I pressed. "Where did you get it?"

He seemed confused. "From you."

"I never gave it to you," I whispered.

"You didn't?" He frowned, then smiled as he remembered. "Oh yeah..." His smile faded. "It was the night you hit me."

I closed my eyes and exhaled. "Greg..."

"It fell on the floor. When you ran away, I picked it up. I don't know why. I've read it like a bajillion times in the last year. I take it with me everywhere."

I opened my eyes again and looked up at him. "You... you do? Why?"

He leaned his head back against the pillow. "Because it helps me feel closer to you."

In spite of myself, I felt the warmth bubble in my stomach and rise into my chest before it erupted into heat which invaded my cheeks. "I thought I lost that book a year ago. It nearly killed me."

"Oh God, Nick, really?!" He looked horrified. "I'm sorry. I didn't know it was that important to you."

I tried to laugh and settled instead for a warm smile. "Don't. I'm... glad, that it helps you like it helped me."

"What do you mean?"

"Those notes in the book—"

"They're brilliant," Greg interrupted. "I've never understood Salinger so well."

"—they aren't mine," I finished.

Again with the vacant stare, broken by a few blinking eyelids. "Then whose are they?"

"A boy named Tony Palmer's," I explained. It had been years since I had spoken his name out loud, and it was like taking out an old photograph from a trunk. It was covered in dust and cobwebs, and I delicately brushed them away, preparing to tell my story. I moved closer to his bed then and sat down in a nearby chair. "Greg, I... Exactly how sober are you, because if you're too drugged up that you won't remember this—"

"I remember everything that has to do with you, Nicky," Greg whispered with a weak smile.

I hesitated. "You're head is clear enough to handle this?"

"Believe me, I'd be worse if I _wasn't_ on drugs," Greg said. "Have you seen my x-rays?"

I winced. "OK. Fine. I've... never talked about this since it happened. And I wouldn't tell you about it, if I didn't feel like you had a right to know. But after all I've put you through, you deserve an explanation. You need to understand."

He nodded, sincerely. "I want to," he assured me.

My eyes focused on the sheets of his bed. I couldn't look at him for long, not without worrying I'd see Tony in his eyes. I opened my mouth and began the long, excruciating tale of what happened when I was a teenager. I couldn't go into details, I wasn't that ready, but he needed to know my crimes. He deserved to know my crimes. "When I was fifteen, I met a boy..."

"Tony," Greg said, nodding.

"You're sharper than you let on," I joked.

"Mm, druggies often are." He smiled. I was glad for the soft expression that graced his lips, with echoes of the old Greg that I had tried so hard to keep from falling off the cliff. But fall he did, however he seemed to retain some fragments of his old, innocent self. I wish I had been so lucky.

I pressed on. "He tutored me in English. _To Kill A Mockingbird _and _The Catcher In The Rye_ specifically. Before him, I hated books. I thought they were dull and pointless, and I never read them. But I wanted to impress him. _Needed_ to impress him..."

What would Greg think of me when this story was done? Would he think I was disgusting and diseased, like my oldest sister? Or would he think I was weak, like my oldest brother? Or would he abandon me, like my youngest sister, to brave the underworld alone?

"Nick..." Greg began, startling me from my thoughts. It was then that I realized I had been quiet for quite some time. "Listen. I was... wrong to push you before. I get that now, I do. You don't have to tell me this if you don't want to."

I appreciated his effort. "No, no, I do. I'm just... scared what you'll think when I'm done."

He chortled lightly. "Nothing would ever make me think any less of you, Nick," he said quietly. "Even if you killed this boy, I wouldn't care... Nick?"

I felt the heat dissolve from my face and he had noticed. I coughed to dispel the awkwardness. "Tony made me realize how I could get lost in a good novel," I continued. "Especially _Catcher_. I lost my copy, so he gave me his own, notes and everything. One day... being teenagers as we were, we..." The words stopped coming. My body was revolting, refusing to confess to a crime I committed over twenty years ago. But I suppressed the rebellion and forced myself to go on. "My brother, Luke, he's three years older than me, he came up to call me down for dinner and caught Tony and I on my bed... t-together."

I could feel the heat return to my face with a vengeance, flooding it with crimson so fast it almost burned. I closed my eyes tightly, waiting for Greg to speak, but he said absolutely nothing. I opened my eyes again and had to steal a glance. His face was blank, but his eyes were attentive. He didn't say a word, he just waited for me to go on.

"I..." I needed to know what he thought about that. "Do you... understand?"

Slowly, his expression unchanging, he nodded up and down. But his lips never parted. Maybe he was reserving judgment for the end of my tale. Maybe then he would cast me out of his good graces and tell me to never come back. Over twenty years, I couldn't care less about what God thought of me anymore. The only God I served now was Greg Sanders, and if that was heresy, then I didn't care.

I continued. "I thought, maybe, he'd missed it. Or he didn't care, because he didn't say anything, not right away. But the next day, Eve, my big sister, told me that Tony had been..." Flashes of ancient nightmares of a teenage boy being slaughtered by familiar faces flashed before my mind's eye. Now more than ever, I couldn't bring myself to look at Greg. I felt my body shake as the sobs collected in my chest, preparing to charge through my mouth and render me speechless and inconsolable. But I wouldn't let them. I had to finish my story.

"Tony was beaten half to death on our street. He fell into a coma, and never recovered."

There was a pause, and then Greg finally spoke. "Nick, I'm so sorry. I never... I never imagined..."

"It's not over," I warned, rubbing at my eyes and glancing up at him again. "I was alone in the house with my two older brothers. They knocked a little sense into me as well. Until my sisters came home and told them to stop."

"Thank God for sisters, then," Greg said at an attempt at levity.

But I shook my head, my eyes moving to the corner of the room, remembering. "Not quite." I shivered, but shook it off. "Abby... she tried to stand up for me. But Eve..." I laughed. "Eve has her principals. Religion, Reputation, and Family. In that order."

I felt something warm and multi-textured cover my hand and looked down to see that it was Greg. Two of his fingers were bandaged in gauze, but the others gently stroked the top of my hand. I drew strength from his touch.

"She told me to lie. They all lied. Said I got mugged on the street. Dad told me I was brave. Mom said they loved me. But Eve and Matt both said they loved me too, so I didn't really understand what that meant anymore. I didn't really understand... anything."

Greg was silent for a long time as I tried to gather my own thoughts. And then, his hand turned mine over, and he traced the lines in my palm with his thumb like a fortune teller. I closed my eyes, focusing on the gauze and skin that was enveloping my hand. The ridges of the tip of Greg's thumb moved softly across the surface of my palm in repetitive strokes. It was soothing, and for once I didn't feel the anger stirring inside me at the thought of Greg's touch. It was as if, with telling that story, I had expelled some sort of demon inside of me, and it was gone. I wasn't alone anymore, and I would never have to be again.

I sighed and leaned my head on the bed. "I hit you because... because that's how I was taught to react, when I..."

Something moved beneath my ear and I sat up slightly, realizing that I had chosen to rest my head on Greg's legs. I pulled my hand away from him, terrified that my bulky head had somehow caused him pain, when he stopped moving.

"What's wrong?" he asked.

"Your legs, I didn't want to hurt you..." I explained.

And then, he laughed. Nothing was disguised in it, it wasn't bitter or awkward or defeated. It was a loud guffaw and he shook his head at me as if I were crazy. "I'm on morphine, Nick."

It was my turn to blink stupidly. "Oh... Still, I don't want to aggravate your injuries."

Greg reached out and took my hand again. "Can I ask you something?"

"Anything."

"The night you hit me..." Greg began. "When I was sitting on your couch and you turned to me... Were... were you gonna kiss me?"

I detected no horror or disgust in his voice when he said it, but I immediately jumped to the conclusion that he was accusing me and I stiffened. I tried to pull my hand away from him, but he clutched it tightly, and I didn't want to strain too hard for fear of breaking his brittle fingers.

"Gr-Greg, I-I'm sorry, I just—"

He cut me off with another barking laugh. "Oh thank God!" he breathed, his voice shaking with relief. "I thought I'd scared you..."

"You do scare me, Greg," I whispered. "For years after Tony, I didn't know who I was. And then I found you, and I remembered. And it's terrifying, realizing you've been pretending to be this other person your whole life and suddenly you can't anymore. But I don't want to go back. I can't. But I've been conditioned to react badly in these situations. And I'm scared I'll hurt you again."

His eyes sparkled. "No, you won't."

"Greg, psychologically speaking, I'm all fucked up."

"So I'll fix you," said Greg with a proud smile.

I squeezed his hand, bringing my other one up to cover my mouth as I held back a helpless cry. "I can't risk..."

"How do you feel right now?" he asked.

"Head spinning... fever spiking... heart racing..."

"Do you want to hit me?"

And it occurred to me. "No, I... I don't."

He spoke his next words more slowly. "So w-what do you w-want to do, then?"

I waded through my muddled thoughts until I found his answer. "I think... I think I want to kiss you."

He was grinning now, his eyes pleading. "Won't you?"

There was something stronger than gravity that made me get up out of that chair and move cautiously but steadily closer to him, my hands gripping the side of his head, my thumbs brushing the linen bandage that adorned his golden curls. And in the back of my mind, I still heard Eve's voice telling me that it was a sin, and that I would go to Hell, get a disease and die, in that order. But I was a heretic, and my blaspheming mouth desperately needed to drink in the prayers of my new God.

I leaned forward and closed my eyes until my lips brushed against his softly, dryly. I felt my hands shaking and, not wanting to transfer that tremor to Greg, I removed them from his head and brought them down to rest against his chest. My mind was screaming at me to pull away, but my body urged me closer and I dove deeper into the kiss. My hands clenched, taking his hospital gown in my fists, and I felt his hands gripping my forearms, grounding me, reminding me that I wasn't alone, and that he would be here to guide me. It was saintly sinful, wickedly divine, as our lips gently savored each other's flavor. My stomach twisted, memories of Luke kicking me in the ribs and Matt striking me in the face churned inside of me and my body began to tense, preparing to fight back, imagining that I would need to defend myself.

I released Greg's gown and pushed myself backward, staring at him wide-eyed, the need to hit him, or hit _something_ welling up inside of me, conquering my need to be near him, to be kissing him, touching him, breathing him in...

"This is bad..." I choked.

"You couldn't have expected it to be all better in one sitting," Greg replied, although he wore a frightened smile. "Come on, Nick. You can beat this. I'll help you."

"_You can beat this, I know you can..._"

"That's what Eve said..."

"Nicky..." Greg begged. "I know they're your family. But it sounds to me that they're a bunch of assholes."

And in spite of everything, I had to laugh at that, and it released all of the tension inside of me. "Yeah, I know."

His smile slowly strengthened. "This isn't some disease you have, Nick. There's nothing wrong with you."

I slowly took a step closer. "I know."

"No one should ever tell you how to feel."

Another step. "I know."

"You're not alone. Never alone."

I took his hand in mine and smiled. "I know. You'll help me through this?"

"We'll do it together," he said with a smile. "Because I care about you, Nick. You know that, right?"

I thought of all the people who had said that to me in my life. My parents, my brothers and sisters, Nancy Hart... "_I care about you, Nicky. Don't you trust me?_"

And I looked at Greg, and saw the worry and fear and the deep, untainted affection with which he looked at me, and I finally understood what those words meant.

"I know."


	6. A Sin To Kill A Mockingbird

**Part Four: A Sin To Kill A Mockingbird**

_**Author's Note:**_ Part four is in one piece. Part five is, most likely, the last installment. Enjoy, and keep an eye out for "Kidnapping Virgin," a comedy co-written by LaughableBlackStorm that will be arriving soon.

* * *

"When he gave us our air-rifles Atticus wouldn't teach us to shoot. Uncle Jack instructed us in the rudiments thereof; he said Atticus wasn't interested in guns. Atticus said to Jem, "I'd rather you shot at tin cans in the back yard, but I know you'll go after birds. Shoot all the bluejays you want, if you can hit 'em, but remember it's a sin to kill a mockingbird." That was the only time I ever hear Atticus say it was a sin to do something, and I asked Miss Maudie about it. "You're father's right," she said. "Mockingbirds don't do one thing but make music for us to enjoy. They don't eat up people's gardens, don't nest in corncribs, they don't do one thing but sing their hearts out for us. That's why it's a sin to kill a mocking bird.""**-- Harper Lee, _To Kill A Mockingbird_, Chapter Nine.  
**

* * *

We weren't a couple. That's what Greg would say, not me. He said it often, too often. I think he was trying to help me adjust and take things slow, but every time the words escaped his lips it seemed to take a toll on him.

"We aren't a couple," he'd say, shoving his hands in his pockets and shrugging his shoulders helplessly. "We're just two guys who..."

"Go on dates?" I would supply, trying to be funny and helpful all at once.

"Sure," he'd agree, and then swiftly changed the subject. I could tell it was hard for him to hold back. Sometimes when we'd go out to the movies, I'd feel him tense next to me, and it generally had nothing to do with whatever was happening on screen. Once or twice I'd glance over and see his hand tightly gripping his knee.

And then, one night, during some action film I don't remember now, I reached out and covered that hand with my own. He looked up, clearly startled, but then a smile slowly formed on his face and he turned his palm up and interlaced his fingers with mine. I wanted to tell him that he didn't need to be afraid to touch me, but I wasn't sure if it was the truth. But I held his hand throughout the entire movie without wanting to punch him. And that had to count for something, didn't it?

That night, he drove me home, and was chattier than ever, which meant that he was wired from _something_. Either he'd had too much sugar or caffeine, or he was out of his mind with nerves, or all of the above. I'd probably triggered it, too, by taking his hand in the theater. For some reason, the fact that I made Greg Sanders nervous often brought a smile to my lips. We had "not been a couple" for a few weeks, over a month, and hand holding and maybe a kiss was about as far as we ever got, and he _always_ waited for me to initiate it. He was patient, timid, and reserved. I know he was still afraid of me. And it all didn't make sense. He knew I was damaged. He knew that I had the potential to hurt him, beyond breaking hearts. And yet, he was still here, babbling on because I had touched his hand.

"—so crappy these days, I mean ridiculous, have you listened to the news they cover now, I mean, it's not even real _news_, I miss the old NPR, the one that covered interesting stories and not the price of corn in Brazil—"

"Why do you do this?"

I saw his words screech to a halt, probably congesting the freeways of his thoughts. "Wha-what?" He glanced at me nervously as the car came to a stoplight, and everything that had been moving was suddenly at a stark standstill. It was dark, but I could see the crimson flush his face.

"How can you be so patient?" I explained. "You must be going crazy. You're terrified of me—"

"Nick, I—"

"And you have every _right_ to be, _that_ makes sense, but you... You're not making sense."

He blinked, and I saw him tremble slightly in the shadows as his grip tightened on the steering wheel. "W-what do you mean, Nicky?" he asked shakily.

"Oh God..." I muttered, recognizing the look in his eyes. "You're scared right now, aren't you?"

He turned resolutely away from me and stared at the stoplight with his jaw set. "No, I'm not."

"You are!" I exclaimed.

"No, I'm not, I'm fucking out of my _mind_, Nick!" he yelled, and then laughed hysterically. "You do this to me, you make me..." He held his breath, waiting for the word to come, but just shook his head and shrugged when it never did. He turned and gave me an awkward smile. "I don't know, I guess."

"Then why are you still here?" I pressed. "With... with me?"

"Why not?" he returned. "Who says I don't like being out of my mind?"

But it still didn't make sense. "You're afraid me," I stated frankly. "I make you nervous, I make you meek, I'm... romantically dysfunctional, I make you wait, and all you get out of it is maybe holding hands or a kiss, and that's if you're lucky. Why do you stay with me?"

I saw him shake his head as the light turned green and he hit the gas. "Because you make me crazy, Nick."

"We've established that."

"No, you don't get," he said with a light chuckle. "In all the time I've known you, I've only ever wanted one thing, and that was to know everything about you. And I never imagined that you might... feel the same about me, I mean..." He glanced at me again. "You hide well." It was supposed to be a compliment, but it burned me somehow and I flinched. "And so I just... I just wanted to know you, Nick. To be around you. To talk to you. To do anything to make you..." He grimaced, as if he didn't like the word that lingered on his tongue. "Happy." He snorted after he said it and rolled his eyes at me. "God, how lame does that sound, right?"

He was right, of course. How many times have I heard that line in romantic movies? And yet, no one had ever said it to me before. Not even my parents. It was implied that they wanted me to be happy, but no one had ever outright said it to me like that before. Then again, no one had ever really known who I was completely and not condemned me for it. Except for Tony.

I felt the smile jerkily possess my lips and wrapped my arms around myself, feeling oddly giddy. "Thanks, Greg."

"Yeah, well I mean it," he muttered, almost stubbornly. "As lame as it sounds. This... relationship or whatever that we have... It's not about hand holding or kissing or making out or sex or whatever. It's about doing what feels right for you. And right now, that clearly isn't anything too... crazy. I think you need to visit your therapist a few more times before we go too fast. And it's not like we're... a couple or anything, right?" He tried to smile out of the corner of his mouth, but I could not interpret its authenticity.

I had the urge to make it real. "We are."

He glanced at me once, and then again, as if he hadn't heard me right. "What?"

I couldn't believe I was saying this. "We are. A couple, I mean."

"Are you sure?" He sounded anxious, like a little boy who was just told he'd be getting everything he wanted come Christmas. "I mean..."

"Greg, we've been doing this dance for over a month now, I think we should just call it what it is." I laughed lightly, mostly to destroy the lump in my throat.

"O-OK." He was stuttering again, but at least now he was genuinely smiling, outright beaming in fact as he opened and closed his hands against the wheel. "OK," he repeated, more confidently as he nodded.

He pulled up outside of my place and drummed the wheel nervously, chewing on his bottom lip. He glanced at me before grinning. "Um, not that you, er, need it or anything, and not like I expect anything, but... you wanna... let me... maybe... walk you to your door?"

I laughed loudly and saw him shrink into himself. I reached out to take his hand and reassure him. "Yes, Greg," I told him. "That'd be fine."

His smile took up the better half of his face as he nodded vigorously and quickly leapt out of the car. I was already out by the time he got to my side. But he walked next to me across the street. And he didn't touch me. I could tell he desperately wanted to, but Greg had more self-control than I would have given him credit for. His hands twitched and I looked at him, the echoes of my siblings' voices more like ghosts now. Things were slowly getting better. Maybe he shouldn't be afraid to touch me.

I extended my arm slightly outward to him, expecting him to take my hand, when he surprised me by embracing my whole arm and leaning his head against my shoulder, making me jump slightly, the old fear returning in my mind as I imagined that someone would see us, would kill us, and for a panicked moment, I almost wanted to pull away, shake him off, deny everything, scream harassment—

And then, he spoke. "I'm sorry, I just..." His restraint seemed to return and he let go of my arm, moving slightly away as he wrung out his hands and gave me an awkward smile. "I just want to hug you so bad right now."

My heart was rattling against my ribcage as the terror slowly subsided and I forced myself to calm down. I tried to smile and laugh it off. All the boy wanted to do was hug me. And I couldn't even give him _that_.

I took a deep, shaky breath. "S'alright, Greg," I insisted.

He was still squeezing his own hands. "Still no good with the touching, huh?"

I looked at the door to my apartment. "No, not so much."

Greg nodded, and I could tell he was trying very hard to remain understanding. "It's just... before all this... happened. You... you used to touch me all the time."

I felt my heart lurch. "Greg..."

"No, it's fine, I get," he said quickly with a smile.

"No, I... I _want_ to, I'm just..." I sighed, completely pissed off at this stupid, screwed up brain of mine. "I don't want to hurt you. In... _any_ way. OK?"

He pursed his lips, then slowly nodded. "OK. I understand." I wasn't sure if he really did, but I knew he was trying as hard as he could to make that statement the truth. I looked at the door to my apartment building and punched in the code.

The door clicked open, when I heard Greg suddenly ask, "Can I, um, have one?"

I hesitated and blinked at him. "One what?"

In the buzzing florescent light that hung above my apartment door, I saw his face flood with color as his hands dug deeply into his jean pockets. He kicked the ground with his shoe. "Um... a hug."

If I was made of a substance that could change phases, I swear, my whole body would have melted. My arms twitched, but did not rise in reply.

"I mean..." Greg continued, awkwardly. "You know. A man hug. The type of thing... frat brothers do or... hockey players. Can we pretend we're hockey players?"

I suppressed a giggle, worried it would offend him. But I nodded. "Yeah," I said. "We could be hockey players."

He pulled his hands rapidly from his pockets and opened them wide. "Then come here, teammate."

I couldn't hold it in any longer and the laugh escaped my lips as I wrapped my arms around him. He patted me on the back quite hard. He really meant the hockey player analogy. I felt the violent urge inside me still simmering, but it was muted by how comfortable I actually felt in Greg's arms, overly-macho hug and all.

He didn't seem to want to linger too long, so he pulled away, and I was glad for the smile on his face, but upset that I couldn't do more than hug him. "I'm sorry, Greg," I said. "But I'll get better, I promise."

He chortled lightly. "I don't suppose hockey players kiss each other, do they?"

I hesitated as my body began to tense. That was normally a bad sign. "Not tonight, Greggo."

The disappointment in his eyes was evident, though he tried to hide it with a smile. "Hey, I've waited this long," he said with a shrug.

"I'll see you tomorrow, Greg."

"Tomorrow, then," Greg said with a nod, and headed back for his car.

I made my way up the staircase, a sense of calm washing over me. The more time I spent with Greg, the less I felt the violent urges inside of me. My therapist tried to assure me that with continued counseling, I would eventually have it completely under control. Along with Greg, she constantly assured me that my feelings for men were not obscene or unnatural, but actually quite the opposite. It's hard to fight a Baptist Texan upbringing, but as a team, the three of us were doing a pretty damn good job of it.

I entered my apartment and was about to head straight to my room when I saw a message blinking on my machine. This was interesting, as most people I knew reached me through my cell phone. The only people who called my house were telemarketers and...

And my family.

My eyes widened and my heart leapt into my throat as I hit the play button. My machine informed me, in that mechanical female voice, that I had exactly one new message, left on my machine about an hour ago.

"Nicky... It's me." And I knew that voice. I froze, my ears hanging on every syllable. "I'm sorry I haven't called you sooner. The last message you left me, you sounded like... like you could have used a friend. And I wasn't there. I bet that hurt you, baby brother. And I'm sorry. We should talk. Call me. You know the number." And I did. There was a click and she hung up.

I immediately seized my phone. It rang twice before I got an answer. "Nick?"

I sighed at the sound of her voice. "Abby."

"Oh my God..." she breathed. "This is coming about a year and a half too late, but I am _so_ glad you're OK!"

"How are Chico and Liberty?"

"They're fine," she assured me.

It was Abby who convinced me to move to Vegas. She was the only Stokes to skip college. She dropped out at nineteen, eloping in Sin City with a man named Chico, who my Dad still lovingly calls a "weed-smoking hippy." They joined the Peace Corps together and spent two years in Venezuela. At first, we all thought it was just her way of rebelling, but they're still together. The happy couple now lives in Seattle. He paints for a living and she teaches ceramics at the local community college. They only have one child—a little girl, born in New York City in 1998 named Liberty "Libby" Sanchez. I still laugh when I remember that I have a niece named after a giant copper statue.

But she hadn't called me in over a year. "Why did you..."

"I know what you're thinking," she whispered. "But I was so scared when Daddy called and told me what happened to you. I convinced myself you were dead. How could you survive something like that? And if you did, what would it do to you? You were already damaged enough, and that was our own damn fault. Our own stupid family."

"Yeah..." I began. "OK, I get that... but a year?!"

"Well, when I worked up the courage to call, I imagined you didn't want to hear from the sister that deserted you in your time of need," she explained. "And by then, you'd stopped trying to get a hold me, too. So I just put it off. And I'm turning thirty-six tomorrow and I just thought it was about time I gave you a call."

I slapped my hand to my forehead. "Oh shit, it's your birthday!" I groaned. "I totally forgot."

"You don't hate me?"

"I love you, Abby," I assured her with a smile. "Ain't nothing you can do to change that. Mom and Dad still love you too, you know, and Chico, despite how they joke. You should call them once in a while."

"How are you doing?" she asked quietly. "And I mean really. None of the, 'I'm fine' bullshit you may feed to Mom and Dad and Evey. But really, how are you?"

I sighed. What a complicated question. "I think I found someone."

She perked up instantly. "Really? Who is he? She?"

I chuckled at the hasty correction. "His name is Greg," I told her. It felt strangely beautiful saying it out loud, and I didn't feel anything but pride in saying it. It made me wonder what I'd been so afraid of. "You always knew, didn't you?"

"Well I figured after... Tony..." She said the name with great hesitation, and my heart panged, but not as much as it would have a year ago. I think I was finally healing.

"Yeah, he was something, wasn't he?" I smiled fondly.

"You sound good, Nick," she said sincerely. "You sound happy."

"Funny choice of words..." I muttered. "You like it when I'm... happy?"

"I always love it when you're happy, Nick," she replied. "I thought that goes without saying."

"Sometimes, you just need someone to say it is all."

There was a pause on the other end of the line. "You know, Nick, Mom and Dad won't care that you're gay."

I cringed when she said it, that old taboo in our home. Spoken by any other sibling but Abby, I would have assumed she was either insulting or pitying mean. "Are you kidding? Have you been away from home so long that you've forgotten who you're talking about?"

"No, I haven't," Abby returned. "And I've been in closer contact with the family than _you've_ been in the last year, or so I hear. In fact, you'll never guess who just came out to Mom and Dad as a lesbian."

I tried to think of the most unlikely candidate possible. "Eve?"

"Are you kidding? Eve would have a heart attack before she admitted she was a lesbian. No, no, no, Nicky, _Judith_."

I blinked, imagining my sister. She was slight, always skinny, fair-skinned with long black hair. "Judy? _Our_ Judy?"

"Yes, our Judy!" I could hear the grin in her voice now. "Do you remember her friend Shauna from high school?"

_Not really_. "Are you telling me—"

"Yes! That's _exactly_ what I'm telling you."

I felt the quiet laugh building in my stomach but couldn't force it out of me just yet. "Judy is..." And there it came, in a great guffaw. "You have _got _to be joking."

"No, it's the truth, I swear! Apparently, Becky knew all along. You know, those two were always pretty close."

"Yeah," I said nodding. "Kinda like you and me." She said nothing. "Hey, so what did Mom and Dad say anyway?"

"Well, Mom was kind of shocked. But after a moment, she told her that whatever made Judy happy was fine with her. Dad asked if Judy had ever tried dating a very feminine man instead. But Mom hit him."

I couldn't believe what Abby was telling me. "They were... OK with this?"

"As OK as they can be, considering," Abby replied. "It's obvious they don't agree with it, but there's not exactly anything they can do to change it, and I think they accept that. Besides, Mom loved that _Queer Eye_ show. I think she always secretly wanted them to come and make Dad over."

My knees went weak and I fell to my couch, breathless, a wave of some new sense of liberation slowly washing over me, licking me clean. "You're serious?"

"Would I lie to you, baby brother?" She was laughing now, and the sound of it brought a smile to my own lips.

"What did Eve say?" I panted, trying to catch my breath.

"Well, Mom and Dad thought it would be best to tell the rest of the family at Christmas..." she told me. "Luke, Matthew and Eve have no idea."

My head was spinning. If what she said was true, then maybe I didn't have to hide anymore. I've already experienced the worst reactions to my confession. Maybe my parents would be more understanding than I gave them credit for. Maybe my father would still smile when he called me Poncho. Maybe my mother would still embrace me warmly at every family get-together. Maybe the ones that really mattered wouldn't really care after all.

I exhaled a shuddering breath, my mind reeling from this revelation about my sister and my family. Thoughts of Greg swirled around inside my head like a building hurricane. I imagined wrapping my arms around him, inhaling his scent, closing my eyes... I waited for the rage to overwhelm me; I expected to bring my fist down on my coffee table; I anticipated breaking something. But no violent thoughts came. Only thoughts of Greg, of touching him, holding him, being held by him, breathing him in, tasting him, feeling his voice vibrate in his throat as I kissed his neck...

And no violent urges surfaced.

"Abby..." I breathed, the want for Greg making me clench my fists, regretting not taking him in my arms earlier and kissing him like he deserved. "Abby, I've been... not doing very well."

"You've been through enough for a millennium let alone thirty-five years," said Abby. "You deserve a little bit of peace. That's why I'm really glad you've found someone."

"I can't touch him," I explained. "I can't touch him without wanting to hurt him. Or at least I couldn't. It's been getting better. I'm in therapy."

"Good..." But she sounded wary. "You can't touch him?"

"Logically, I tell myself daily that there's nothing wrong with me," I explained. "I tell myself that it's OK to want to touch him. And I try, and I just feel so... I've been conditioned to feel wrong about it, I think, and when it feels right then it makes me... angry. Even now, I'm still scared that I'll hurt him."

"You couldn't hurt a fly," said Abby fondly.

"Maybe not a fly, but I've hurt Greg before," I told her somberly. "And I don't know what I would do if I hurt him again."

"Nick?" Her voice was questioning, as if me being violent was a difficult concept for her to imagine.

"I hit him, Abby," I reiterated. "Hard. And it was bad."

"Fucking Matthew and Luke!" Abby suddenly burst out. "I had no _idea_ they fucked you up this bad. I'm gonna wring their fucking throats, so help me God I will, next time I see their asses they're fucking dead."

I don't think I'd ever heard Abby say the word 'fuck' ever, let alone multiple times in one breath. "Abby...?" I asked tentatively.

I heard her sigh, calming herself down. "Sorry, Nick, but... Even now, I still can't believe what they did. I can't... I regret not doing anything then. And it's not like now will make much of a difference."

I knew what she meant. These quiet secrets that we keep, the scars we cover up with smiles... Sometimes, we imagine it would be easier to unravel the lie, to scream the truth, but we know it will just make things worse now.

"There's no statute of limitations on murder..." Abby muttered. "What if..."

But she knew as well as I that our words would make no difference. Not when Matt was now a respected member of the Dallas Police Force, and Luke an esteemed ADA. Moreover, I didn't want to dredge it all up, digging up corpses for the sake of condemning my own brothers...

If Eve was right about anything, it was about forgiveness. Whatever God I still believed in, I had faith that he would deal out justice in his own way. Maybe it was naive, but I desperately had to believe in something.

"It won't work, Abby. It'll just cause chaos."

"Doesn't he deserve justice?" Abby asked, her voice shaking. "Doesn't he deserve to have a voice?"

I closed my eyes, feeling the familiar sting as I remembered Tony's voice. "It's a sin to kill a mockingbird, Abby."

"What?"

"Matt's a cop, Luke's an ADA, you don't think they have connections? Not to mention what it would do to Mom and Dad. They'd be devastated. And we don't have anything on them but something Matt may have said twenty years ago, which he could easily deny. Eve wouldn't back us up either."

"I'm all screwed up about this Nick," she whispered. "I always have been."

I realized then that I wasn't the only one who had been broken that day. "There is something in this world that is... bigger than our legal system. I can't describe it. It's large and universal and ineffable. And Matt and Luke crossed that cosmic line, they committed one of the worst... _sins_, and they can't hide from that. They killed a young boy, who didn't do any harm to them. They killed the mockingbird, Abby. And I don't think that's something they can just run away from."

"I admire you," she breathed, and her smile was gone, I could tell. She sniffed, her voice still trembling like a branch in the wind. "You are such a better person than me. I lost my faith a long time ago, but through everything you seem to still have yours."

"Maybe I am as good as Job after all," I joked.

It worked. She laughed. "Oh God, baby brother... You are so much more than Job."


	7. Biblical

**Part Five: Biblical  
**

_**Author's Note:**_ The end. Upon request, I may be inclined to write a sequel. But later. The first NPR story is transcribed almost directly from when I turned on the radio for an idea of what they'd be talking about.

* * *

"I want to know one thing: the way to heaven. God himself has condescended to teach me the way. He has written it down in a book. Oh, give me that book! At any price give me the book of God. Let me be a man of one book."**--John Wesley**

* * *

Generally speaking, I love my job. I work with brilliant people, I solve riddles, and I help bring solace to grieving families, and justice to the dead. But sometimes, the whole process can just be tedious. Like sorting through the contents of a shredder searching for a fingertip that may or may not be intact. Blood on every single scrap of paper, but as of yet no flesh.

"How much of this guy did they shove in here?" I muttered.

"Just his hand," I heard Catherine reply from the other side of the room. She was smugly reviewing the case file and refusing to help.

"What happened to the rest of him?"

"Dunno," Catherine said. "That's why we need you to find his finger." She smiled before nodding at the door. "I'm gonna go get some coffee. You want?"

"No thanks, but what _would_ be nice is a little _help_ here," I said.

She laughed. "Greg, consider this a right of passage. Some day, when you're Level Three, you'll be standing in my place, and finally understand my amusement."

I grumbled as she left, frowning as I tore one strip of bloody paper from another. "Ew." I had seen blood a lot in my job, and that wasn't what disgusted me. It was the mushy paper. When I was little, I couldn't stand the feel of it. I cried when my mom tried to make me do papier-mâché. I wrinkled my nose at the bloody mess and separated the mound in front of me in half, shivering as I felt the squishy substance beneath my gloves. It was a silly thing to be bothered by, but then again it was only one of two things that even fazed me at all on this job.

The other chose that moment to enter the room. I smiled, ignoring the bloody pile of mushy paper in front of me. "Hey, there," I chirped, probably sounding happier than I should have to see him.

He returned the smile, and I saw it reach his eyes, which meant that he really felt it. "Hey, Greg." I love the way he says my name. The way his tongue moves back to curl around the _gr_ like a growl, the southern flare of the _e_, and the concussive blast of the _g_... I know I dwell too much on the details, but I just love everything about that mouth, including the words it pronounces, especially my name. I had this sudden urge to leap up and press my lips against it, sucking lightly on that tongue, but I held back, for his sake. I clenched my teeth and forced my own mouth into a grin.

"You haven't by chance come to help me sort through this mess, have you?"

He laughed lightly and shook his head. He had been laughing a lot lately, and I flattered myself by imagining I was the reason for it. I know that I cracked more jokes when he was around, and I was laughing a bit more myself, ever since he began to trust me again.

"Actually, no," he said, closing the door behind him. He pulled out a chair next to mine and sat down. He leaned forward, touching his fingertips together as he rested his forearms on his knees. I was intrigued, but I had bloody paper mush in my hands, so I couldn't turn to face him entirely. "I wanted to talk to you about something."

"Talking's good," I said, encouraging him. And I meant it. He was finally opening up, letting me in, and I was glad every time that gorgeous mouth decided to share with me, in any sense. I was finally getting inside his head.

"Yeah..." he mumbled, but said nothing more.

I frowned, wondering why he had suddenly turned so coy. My head swiveled on my shoulders to look at him, my eyes drinking him in. "What's the matter?"

He tried to shrug it off. "Talking's great, but..."

_Uh oh,_ I thought. Was this _that_ conversation? "Wait a minute," I began. "I thought the turn of phrase is 'we need to talk,' isn't it?"

He seemed bemused. "What? Don't they mean the same thing?"

"No," I told him seriously. "One means you want to tell me something important. The other means you want us to... not be a couple anymore."

"Oh, Greg, no..." he said with a sigh, comprehension dawning. "No, that's not what I want."

I relaxed, or at least, became as relaxed as I could get with Nick in the same room as me, close enough to touch... I mentally slapped my hand away, the image of a child reaching for a toy he couldn't have springing to mind. In a way, it was just like it used to be when we weren't honest about how we felt, and yet it was still so much better than those days. In those days, there had never even been a chance. But now, he was letting me help him. Make him happy.

"Then what is it?" I pressed when he didn't continue. He held his breath, and that's when I noticed he was shaking. "Nicky, breathe before you turn blue!"

He sighed it out through his nose and rolled his eyes. "I can't believe this is so hard for me to say. I thought..."

"Look, what could you _possibly_ say that would elicit a negative reaction from me?" I asked.

"Negative isn't what I'm worried about..."

Now I was _very _intrigued. "Nick, what is it?" He chewed on his bottom lip a moment before smiling at me again. I was frowning, trying to decipher his intent. "Nicky?"

"I don't really know how to say this, but... I think what I'm trying to say is... I want to take this to the next level."

I was in a daze, daring to hope as my heart raced ahead of my thoughts, my hands squeezing the blood out of the paper. "What exactly do you mean by—"

"Whatever you think I mean," he interrupted, that devilish smile still in place.

I opened my fists and the paper fell to the table as I leapt to my feet and stripped off my gloves.

"What are you doing?" he asked with a laugh.

I looked at him as if he were crazy, even though I was the mad one. I held out my hand. I wanted to seize him by the wrist, pull him out of the room, but I doubted he'd be ready for that. "Come with me," I said.

I was mildly surprised when he reached out and took my hand without hesitation. I pulled him to his feet and he stumbled into me, our chests bumping into each other, and suddenly I was breathing his air, his mouth inches away from mine, and I could see the lines in his lips, and how his tongue shot out to moisten them. His breath hitched in his throat, but I waited. Now wasn't the time.

To distract myself, I ducked my head and moved past him on his right, his hand still in mine, and dragged him out of the room and down the hall, searching for the exit.

"Where are we going?" he asked, half-laughing, and I knew this was an adventure for him. I knew that if he wasn't pulling away from me by now, then he had meant what he'd said.

I waved at Sara as we passed her in the hall. She was watching us curiously, her head cocked to the side. She pointed at Nick and seemed about to ask a question when I interrupted her.

"We're taking off early, tell Grissom."

If she wanted to protest, I left her no time, because seconds later we turned the corner.

"What if Griss needs us?" Nick asked, with the air of one who didn't really give a shit one way or the other if Grissom needed us.

"Then he'll call," I replied anyway.

I finally reached my car in the garage and released Nick's hand only to dig out my keys. He moved to the passenger door, obviously aware by now of my intentions. I backed out of the space and Nick sat silent beside me as I made my way out of the parking lot. It was all I could do not to swerve off the road in an effort to get home faster.

"We're going to your place?" Nick guessed.

I hadn't really considered it and began to panic slightly. "Unless you'd be more comfortable at yours..."

"No, your place is fine," said Nick, his voice about half an octave higher than it normally was.

"If you're nervous..." I began. When this whole thing had begun, my brain had been ravaged by the whirlwind that is Nick Stokes. But now, rationality was beginning to swallow me again, and I felt rather guilty for my pushy, spontaneous passion.

"It's natural to be nervous, right?" Nick said with a smile. "But I know what I want, Greg. I want to be with you."

I felt the familiar warmth rise in my cheeks and I grinned stupidly. "We'll go as slow as you like, Nick," I tried to assure him. "I mean, sorry I was so... anxious back in the lab, but—"

"I get it," he interrupted quickly. "It's not a problem. I know I've made you wait a long time for this."

"Not too long, considering," I tried to reason. "I mean, two months, that's pretty short, really. Especially considering all you've been through."

"I'm just worried that..." He trailed off and I glanced at him out of the corners of my eyes.

"Worried that what, Nick?" I probed timorously.

"Nothing. Just drive," said Nick.

Now _I _was worried. "You won't hurt me, Nick."

"I know. Just drive."

"I won't hurt you either, you know."

"I do. Eyes on the road."

He was being evasive all of a sudden and I didn't understand why. "Nick, are you sure this is what you really want?"

"I am," he insisted. "Trust me, Greg, I've been giving this a lot of thought."

So I dropped it, like he clearly wanted me to. I knew that pressing the issue was never a good way to deal with Nick. The last time I pressed the issue, I left his apartment swollen and bruised. And it was a night that would always weigh heavily on both our thoughts, I'm sure.

"We'll move really slow," I repeated. "Like turtles."

"Fuck like turtles? There's a new term." He laughed, but the joke was forced.

"Stop it."

"Stop what?"

"Stealing my technique," I explained. "I thought I was the one who hid behind jokes."

I heard him shift in the seat next to me, and then he reached out and turned on the radio. NPR. Fantastic, something to talk about.

"..._ shared religious belief that the state is greater than the individual... But to most young Russians growing up in a time in which Soviet history is greatly admired, the actions of the Soviet regime is losing its relevance._"

"What do you think about that, huh?" I asked. "KGB was crazy, wasn't it? Crazy times. My Dad said they had a bomb shelter during the cold war. Stocked it with all sorts of things. Did your folks have bomb shelters?"

He said nothing.

"_Good evening, this is All Things Considered—_"

"Oh, I love this show!" I exclaimed.

"_A plane crashed in Panama today, killing hundreds and dozens more are still unaccounted for_—" I switched off the radio.

"Too depressing," I explained. "Plane crashes in Panama... Not cool."

"You deal with dead people every day, Greg," Nick said quietly.

"Yeah, but it doesn't mean I like hearing about tragedies," I returned, almost defensively. And, as my mind normally did when I was in a babbling mood, I leapt to the first relevant topic and, as usual, it was probably a mistake. "Where were you when you heard about the two towers?"

"The diner," said Nick. "Breakfast with Sara and Warrick after shift."

"Mm," I mumbled. "Archie told me. I was working overtime and he dragged me out into the lobby. Scared the shit out of me, I can tell you that. I was in New York for a while, you know, I know a bunch of people there and—"

"Can we talk about something a little less depressing?" Nick asked.

I winced at the verbal slap and sighed. "Sorry." My mind grasped for some lighter subject to hang onto as the silence in the car began to strangle me. "Um..."

"Greg, relax."

The southern drawl was always more pronounced when he was anxious. I smiled. "Who's the pot and who's the kettle here, Mr. Stokes?"

I noticed him tense out of the corner of my eye and he turned to look out the window. I sighed. They were the same words I had uttered in the diner, right before he had hit me again. Well, he hadn't _really_ hit me. It hadn't been violent or even painful, but it had reminded me of all the things that his fist was capable of and I'd been afraid for a millisecond before I had gathered my wits and shrugged it off. Or had pretended to shrug it off.

"It doesn't bother me anymore," I lied. "I'm not afraid of you."

Maybe he knew it was a lie and maybe that's why he kept quiet.

The conversation was in bad need of a change. "Right. Less depressing. Um..." My brain scrambled for a joke. "So did you hear about what happened when the seven dwarves went to Rome?"

He turned, and I saw him smile at me. "You really have a problem with quiet, don't you?"

I chuckled, nervously. "What can I say? You bring out the babbler in me."

"I've noticed."

"Sorry..."

"Don't be," he said sincerely. "I like it. Even if you do like to talk about depressing things."

I genuinely laughed at that as I pulled into my usual parking spot in the garage of my building. I leaned back in my seat and looked at him with a hopeful but timid gaze. "Well? Are you ready?"

"How many times do I have to tell you?" he said with a smile.

I couldn't suppress a grin myself, my heart leaping up into my throat as I shivered with excitement. I threw open the door to the car and by the time I was on the other side Nick was already out. I gestured at the building with my head and began towards it when Nick caught my hand, and the recoil made me stumble backwards into his embrace, subsequently falling into his lips.

I closed my eyes and relished his touch, because we were seldom physically close. I tried as hard as I could to respect the distance he put between us, but now that his feelings were out in the open, now that I knew there was a chance for us, it was harder than ever before to keep my hands off of him.

And then, I felt the all-too-familiar tremble before his grip on me tightened, and I was worried he would pull away, that this was too much too fast, and that we had been stupid. I tensed in his arms, preparing for him to hit me again, telling myself that maybe I would have to hit him back, just to make him stop. But I couldn't hit him back. I could never hit him back.

He broke the kiss with a gasp, but his embrace did not slacken, nor did he push me away from him in terror. He just looked at me with wide, sparkling eyes, absolutely breathless.

"Are you OK with this?"

For the first time that evening, he seemed unsure, and his gaze darted away from mine momentarily before returning again, and he gave a shallow but rapid nod, his mouth partially open. I reached up slowly and traced his bottom lip with my finger, fascinated by how the moist, sensitive flesh felt beneath my fingertip. Just as slowly, Nick's mouth closed around it and I blinked, my eyes moving away from his lips and up to meet his eyes, which were staring at me with a strange, unspoken promise.

My mouth was dry and I swallowed open-mouthed as I just continued to stare at him, feeling the insides of his cheeks press in on either side of my finger, his tongue moving powerfully against the bottom of it, into the creases between my joints and I shuddered.

He meant it. He really fucking _meant_ it, this was really going to _happen_.

I let out a quivering gasp and blinked as I pulled my finger out of his mouth and a smug smile took hold of his features. "You've been making a _lot_ of progress in therapy," I whispered elatedly.

He just nodded and gently took both of my hands, walking backwards behind the car. I laughed, still reeling from the way his tongue felt against my skin, wondering how little it would take to bring me to climax... I would have to be very focused. We would have to go very, painfully slowly. I may have to think of cockroaches and Grissom in order to bring down my over-excited mind.

He hit the button of the elevator and I blindly typed in the code that would call it down. He wasn't touching any part of me but my hands, but it was just as hot as if we were already in bed together. His eyes remained on me, and I didn't dare look away from him, for fear that he would vanish, like some shimmering mirage or maybe an alcohol-induced hallucination.

The elevator arrived and we moved inside, and I couldn't stay away, sliding up against Nick's arm. I was hungry to taste him again, but tried to exercise some restraint, so my lips instead planted soft kisses on his neck. I heard him sigh, his breath shaking, and I know he was with me, completely _with_ me, and we were together...

The doors opened, and it was my turn to take him by the hand as I led him down the hall to my apartment. I quickly fished my keys out of my pocket and stabbed at the lock once or twice before it finally slid into it. It's difficult to unlock doors when my eyes refuse to leave the object of my euphoria.

We stumbled into my living room and I didn't hit the lights, unable to control myself any longer and as soon as that door clicked shut, my hands cupped his face and I kissed him deeply, my mouth pressing against his as I pinned him against the door. The kiss was greedy, needy, and desperate. I wanted him too badly to wait any longer. We said we'd take it slow... I _told_ myself to take it slow. I drew back on the kiss with much effort, my hands moving back and into his bristly hair, wondering momentarily why the hell he had cut it so short. I was so lost in the moment I was on autopilot, my hands moving down to his shoulders, over the chiseled features of his chest to tug on his shirt.

He pulled away from my mouth and gasped my name. "Greg..."

I took the opportunity to kiss down his jaw line, softly at first, my lips barely brushing against his skin, but by the time I met the place where his neck met his shoulder I opened my mouth like a vampire.

"Greg..." he said again.

"Less talking," I panted, pulling away from his skin, my breath sweeping over the wet spots. "More kissing."

My hands roved up beneath his shirt, my palms against the skin of his chest, and oh _wow_, we had never even gotten this far before. If this were any other time, I would have skipped the foreplay, but I promised we would go slow. I kissed up his neck again, finding his lips, which remained stoutly closed, but I landed a soft kiss there anyway, not recognizing how odd it was for him to be so tight-lipped in a moment like this. I moved up to his ear, nibbling lightly on the lobe, and that's when his hands gripped my upper arms and pushed me away and I finally realized he was shaking.

"Greg," he said resolutely, his eyes wide.

My eyes darted up and down and all around. I didn't understand. "What's wrong?"

He pursed his lips as he shook his head. "I... I don't know."

Disappointment plunked into my stomach like a penny in a very deep well. "You're not ready, are you?"

He set his jaw and tried to shrug, and all the while I felt his nails digging into my skin. The longer we stayed so close, the tighter his grip became. I tried to be patient. I tried to ignore the pain that was biting into both of my arms. I tried to understand...

I failed.

Fury overwhelming me, my arms flew up into the air, yanking myself out of his grip as I stepped backwards and focused my eyes, aiming all my malice, all my frustrations, all the anger that he didn't deserve straight at him. I gritted my teeth and breathed through my nose. I tried to calm my self down, so I wouldn't say anything I'd regret.

"You'll never be ready, will you?" I growled, sounding so hostile it shames me now.

He gave me an apologetic look as he shook his head. "I don't know, Greg... I'm sorry."

I just stood there and glowered at him, breathing in and out, trying to force myself to understand, to remember to put myself in his shoes, to think of how hard it would be, but it wasn't working. Logic wasn't a friend of mine in that state. "What? You afraid you'll _hurt_ me?" I demanded icily. "Go ahead and fucking hurt me!"

"Greg, I—"

"_Do it!_" I yelled, my arms wide open. "Hit me."

"Don't do this, Greg."

"I mean it, hit me! Take your best shot."

He wrapped his arms around himself and sniffed. "I-I should go."

"No!" I roared, slapping my hand against the door so he couldn't open it. "Not before you take a fucking shot at me."

He shook his head and I could see the tears blossoming in his eyes. "Greg, I'm sorry."

"Don't apologize," I said, my jaw hanging open as I shook my head at him in awe. "Hit me."

He began to vigorously shake his head. "No."

"Fucking hit me, Nick!"

"No!" he insisted, his voice cracking, and he ducked his head and walked past me towards my bedroom. He stopped, his back to me, his arms folded. He had nowhere to go. "I don't know. I'm sorry. I thought I was ready, but I just... It's too much." He turned around to look at me. "I'm _really_ sorry, Greg."

I was still seething, my hands still clenching and unclenching into fists. "What are you afraid of?"

"I don't want to—"

"No, don't say you don't want to hurt me. That's bullshit. If you had the urge to hit me, you would have done it by now." And then, I spoke through clenched teeth. "I gave you a reason. An excuse. I _asked_ for it, for fuck's sake, and you didn't _do _it!" I paused, taking deep breaths. "So what is it, Nick? Is it me?"

"You're not helping," he pointed out.

Whether or not he was right, it didn't matter because all those two months of waiting, of letting him do everything, of walking on eggshells, it suddenly felt like _too long_, although apparently for Nick it wasn't long enough. And maybe that made me a bad person, to explode at my best friend, my lover, the way I was, but in that moment I wanted to be selfish. I felt I'd earned it.

And so I said the most selfish thing that came to mind. "I love you, Nick."

I saw the tears streak down his face, even in the silver starlight from the windows. "That's not fair," he whispered, his voice a heavy tremolo.

"It's not fair," I repeated, grimly. "There're a lot of things about this that aren't _fair_, Nick."

He rubbed his upper arms and shook his head at me, helplessly. When he spoke again, he sounded like a child. "Please don't ask me to hit you again."

And then, finally, my fury faltered. "I..."

"Please, Greg," Nick begged, and I heard his breathing coming in gasps. "Don't ask me to hit you again."

I chewed on my bottom lip, sympathy overwhelming selfishness, and I finally realized what I had done. I stood there for a moment, watching his body shake, his shoulders move up and down in short, staccato bursts. And then, I took a deep breath and sighed.

"Come here," I said quietly, already striding over to him. He moved forward hesitantly, and we met somewhere in the middle where he buried his face in my shoulder and I enveloped him in my arms. I felt his knees give out, and I wasn't nearly strong enough to hold us both upright, so instead I moved slowly down to the floor, cradling him in my arms as he cried. I blinked as I stared up at the ceiling, feeling this warm, anguished body fall apart in my arms.

It's funny, I always imagined it would be the other way around.

But he needed me, and so I swallowed my pride and just let him cry, cooing in his ear that everything would be alright, and that I was still there, that I would always be there, because that, more than anything else that had been said that night, was the truth. As selfish as I was, I could never leave him. Because I needed him too.

My hand softly stroked the bristles of his hair and I came to the conclusion that it being so short wasn't so bad. It made it incredibly soft. "Sh, it's OK. I'm sorry, Nick. I'm sorry."

He fell asleep in my arms like a frightened child. I whispered his name a few times to make sure, but he was really knocked out. Struggling under the weight of him, I tried to carry him in my arms to the bedroom, but I wasn't strong enough for that. I did manage to sling his arm over my shoulders and I half dragged him to my room. He stirred just enough to help me out a little by stumbling on his feet. After what seemed like a walk across Death Valley, we finally reached my bedroom, and I kicked open the door, laying him carefully on my bed. He rolled over onto his side and it didn't take long for him to fall fast asleep again.

I unlaced his shoes and pulled them off, but didn't dare touch anything else. I did stand back and watch him a moment, serene in his slumber. It brought a small smile to my lips after what had proven to be a very strange evening. I had somehow managed, in all my grand stupidity, to make Nick Stokes cry. I had made him revert back to childhood. How could I have been so cold?

With a tired sigh, I rubbed my eyes with one hand, grabbed a pillow off my bed, and prepared for a long, uncomfortable night on the couch.

* * *

The lumps in my couch meant that I was a pretty light sleeper that night. It wasn't so bad, though. I had crashed on that couch many times in the past, generally after a long shift when I didn't have the energy to make it all the way to my bedroom. But because of the fact that I was always scratching the surface of consciousness, I heard every sound in my apartment. Including a door closing.

My eyes opened and blinked a bit. I rolled my cramped shoulders and saw that it was still dark outside, although lighter shades of purple were creeping in through the blinds. It must not have been long before dawn. Still far too early to be awake. I never woke up until at least noon, and that was if I had to get up early for something before work.

I heard footsteps and didn't move an inch. My ears tuned to the sounds. Someone had entered the room. I didn't need to think hard who it had to be. He didn't touch the lights at all and I heard him head into the kitchen. He turned on the tap, and the sound of rushing water seemed to echo off the walls of my small apartment. And then, it was off again, and he was leaving. The door closed, and he was gone again.

I waited for a long time, my eyes wide open despite my fatigue. Eventually, I sat up and looked at my closed bedroom door. My breathing low and heavy, I carefully rose to my feet and moved towards it. I didn't knock. I didn't open it. I slowly raised my hand, my fingers spread out as I pressed the tips of them against the door, followed by my palm. And soon enough, the rest of me was pressed against it, too. My ear heard the sound of rushing air against the wood, the echoes of minute sounds of the mites that made their homes in my walls, but I did not hear a sound from him.

Moments later, I stumbled forward with a gasp as the door opened again and someone caught me before I hit the ground, my hands gripping strong forceps, and suddenly I was looking up into his glossy eyes, strands of aggravated blood vessels reaching up towards the coffee-brown irises. He didn't look angry, or even particularly upset. He just seemed... a little surprised.

I must have reflected the expression, because I know I definitely felt it. Suddenly, I couldn't breathe, and I wondered when he would say something, when he would ask what I was doing leaning against his door in the middle of the morning, as dawn's light silently slithered in through the windows of my apartment.

But he said nothing as he helped me stand upright on my own again, he simply pushed me aside and walked past me into the living room. I noticed then that he had his shoes on again, and his jacket in his arms.

"Where are you going?" I gasped when I realized I could breathe again.

He stopped, his back going rigid as he faced the front door of my apartment. "It's not fair of me to stay here. Not after how I treated you."

I couldn't suppress an ironic snort. "The way _you_ treated _me_?" I asked. "If I recall, I'm the one that made _you_ cry."

"This isn't... I knew I should never have done this. I should never have..." He turned around and looked at me with a strangely worn and frazzled expression, like a moth-eaten Christmas sweater that has been hiding in a drawer for years. "This isn't fair to you. I don't think that we should keep—"

"Sh!" I hushed him quickly, as if he were just about to say an unforgivable expletive. I rushed towards him, my feet carrying me there before my mind even realized what they were doing and I grasped his shoulders. He wasn't shaking anymore. He was solid as a rock. "No, Nick, please. I'm sorry for what I said, I really am, just..."

He shook his head. "I can't give you what you want. I can't be the person you want me to be."

"I don't want you to be anybody but who you are!" I returned desperately. "Please! I know it's hard for you, and I will try better to understand, I _will_ understand. I shouldn't have exploded at you like I did. I was just—"

"You were tired of waiting," Nick said. "And you had every right to be."

"No, I didn't!" I returned. "No, Nick, I'm never right, not where you're concerned. I'm all wrong when it comes to you. You always win, remember?"

"Greg, do you even know what you're saying?"

"No, I don't," I confessed. "All I know is that I don't want you to leave."

"I don't deserve you..." he whispered, with such sincerity I felt a sharp fissure shoot across the center of my heart.

"That's not true," I uttered, because I knew it couldn't be. "Oh God, all I've ever wanted was to know you. Please, Nick, stay."

He reached up a tender hand and placed it against my cheek and I realized then how cold I must have felt to him, because his hand was like fire against my skin. Not scorching or painful, but sharp and purging, a cleansing warmth that spread like a virus through my bloodstream. I instinctively leaned into his touch, aware that I was now the one trembling.

His thumb brushed my cheekbone and I saw him smile. "I was afraid it would come to this. That's what I was worried about. I was worried if we waited too long, you would lose interest. That you wouldn't want me anymore. I just didn't realize it had already happened."

"It hasn't," I insisted, moving my hands down and pressing my palms into his chest. "It hasn't, and it never _will_. Nick, I still want you, I _need_ you, I will _always_ need you, please, Nicky, stay..."

His hand moved back, his fingers tracing my ear, pushing stray curls behind it. "You can't mean that."

"What I didn't mean was all the things I said that made you cry," I whispered. "But this... this is the truth."

"Greg, I'm sorry—" But I cut him off with my actions, my lips claiming his for my own, frantic and frightened, but I wasn't about to lose him, not now, not ever.

I knew he wanted this, because his jacket fell to the floor and his arms moved to embrace me, pressing against my back like he needed me there just as badly as I needed him. And he returned my anxious actions, his tongue dancing against mine, his whole body singing in tune with mine. I didn't even realize that I was stumbling backwards, and that he was following, that I was leading this dance, but where I was leading us to, I was unsure.

We moved through a door, his hands roaming all over me as I wrapped my arms around his neck, refusing to let him go, to let him leave. This wasn't over, couldn't be over, because I needed him too damn much. And then, the back of my knees knocked against something soft and covered in fabric and I knew where my sorry legs had carried us, where I had led him. He didn't seem to mind, though, because he leaned into me, forcing me first to sit and then lie backwards on the bed, his mouth moving down my neck just as I had done to him hours before. I closed my eyes, reeling inside of his attentions. I had wanted this for so long, needed this for so long, and yet...

"Nick..." I breathed as his hands moved underneath my shirt.

"Mm?" he replied, his lips vibrating against the skin over my collarbone, sending tingles down my spine. He tugged at my shirt and, helpless, I raised my arms and let him pull it off. He took that moment to strip off his own shirt. His hands clasped my wrists above my head before sliding down the lengths of my arms and then my sides, his hands gripping my hips where I was wearing nothing but my boxers. His mouth was traveling down my shoulder, lingering on my chest, and I closed my eyes, forgetting the protest I had been about to mutter, because he was doing this, and he wanted to do this, he must...

And then I felt something white hot fall onto my chest like acid rain and I opened my eyes because I knew exactly what it was. His hands still gripped my hips, his fingers clenching and biting into the skin, his mouth furiously ravaging me, and I knew that I should have stopped this long ago. I gently reached down, my hands softly stroking his hair before moving down to his chin, forcing him to look up at me.

I saw the shimmering streaks of water on his face and noticed the trails his tears had blazed across my chest. He was shaking again, and crying, and I knew this wasn't the time. And that was OK.

"You don't want this," I said.

"I do, so badly, I just don't know how..." he whimpered.

I smiled softly, my hands moving down beneath his arms and I pulled him up so we were face to face again, his hands on the bed by my shoulders to keep his weight off of me. My arms snaked around his torso and gently moved up and down his back. "Why are you crying?"

"Dream..." he muttered, then looked surprised, as if he hadn't meant to answer my question with the truth. He rolled off of me onto the side of the bed and stared at the ceiling, blinking the tears out of his eyes.

I turned onto my side, propping myself with my elbow. My hand glided across the surface of the bed and crawled up onto his chest where my fingers traced the lines there, feeling his lungs contract and expand. "Talk to me," I whispered.

His chest heaved and he sighed as my hand moved down the center of his abs to circle his naval. I watched it a moment and so did he, before my eyes roamed up to his eyes as I studied his expression.

"You don't want to hear about it," he said. "I shouldn't have mentioned it."

I smiled and inched a little bit closer to him on the bed. "You should know by now, Nick. I want to know everything about you."

He shook his head. "It doesn't really bother me all that much anymore."

"It's bothered you enough to want to distract yourself with sex. Sex with _me_, no less. That must mean something."

He turned his head and gave me a curious look. "Did you mean it when you said you loved me last night?"

Talk about a loaded question. "Probably," I answered, my eyes focusing again on the hand that was mapping out his chest. "I don't know." It was a lie. I knew, I was positive. I had always known.

"I don't know if I love you back," Nick whispered, "because 'love' isn't a word I really understand anymore. A lot of people have said that to me, and yet those same people have... scarred me."

"I would never hurt you, Nick," I told him honestly. "And if I did, then I would kick my own ass for it. Now tell me about this dream."

He shook his head. "It's just about... something that happened a long time ago. A recurring nightmare. I had it again tonight, and I couldn't get back to sleep. So I was going to go home, and then you... you came, and I..."

"I did. Do," I said suddenly, unsure of why I had been compelled to say it.

He blinked at me. "Do what?"

"Mean it," I explained. "When I said... when I say that I love you."

He slowly smiled, and his hand reached up to clasp the hand that was on his chest. "And if I'm capable of love... I think I would love you."

"You are," I said without missing a beat. "Capable." I snuggled up closer to him, resting my head on his shoulder as his arm encircled my own shoulders. "I can see it in you."

"Do you think I love you?"

"I know it," I said with a smirk. "Now. Your dream."

He pulled his arm away from my shoulders and rolled onto his side as I had done previously. I propped myself up again until we mirrored each other so he could look me in the eye straight on. I tilted my forehead against his and smiled encouragingly, my hand moving up his chest to his shoulder, and then down his wonderfully toned biceps.

"Remember when you told me about Tony?" I whispered, noticing he needed some encouragement. "And remember how it helped you feel a little better about everything?"

He sighed and gently leaned forward, his lips delicately brushing against mine before he pulled away again.

"OK," he sighed. I continued to stroke his arm, trying to reassure him that I would still be here at the end of his story. "I'm not going to go into details, though," he added hastily. "I can't, not yet. But when I was nine, there was this woman. She was a friend of a friend, and my mom asked her to babysit because all of my siblings were otherwise occupied. We were alone in the house. And I had to mind her. My mother and my big sister both told me that I had to do what she said..."

I was concerned as he trailed off and my hand slid down the length of his arm until I found his fingers. I took his hand and brought it gently to my lips. "You're safe in this room, Nick," I whispered, my breath dancing across his knuckles. "Nothing can hurt you here. Not when you're with me."

He smiled then, a warm and grateful grin that danced in his eyes as he reached out and tenderly stroked my hair. "You're right," he said, and I could hear the honesty ringing in his tone. "I _feel_ it with you."

I placed my other hand over the one I held. "So go on."

He inhaled a shuddering breath before sighing. "I trusted her. I let her..." He closed his eyes and swallowed. My thumb ran over the back of his hand. I had the most disconcerting feeling that I knew what he was going to say, but he needed to say it. And I needed to hear him say it. "Her hands were... not where they should have been. And every night, those dark eyes, that mockingly innocent voice, it... In the dream, we're in the sky, and she's an angel, and she wraps her arms around me and becomes... something else. And then I start falling."

"Do you ever reach the bottom?" I asked.

He blinked at me. "No."

I smiled. "Good. That means you're not dead yet."

I saw him start trembling again and hushed him as I wrapped my arms around him, placing my chin on top of his head as he buried his face in my chest.

"You don't seem too surprised."

"I knew what you were going to say," I told him honestly, glad that I had kept my own voice from faltering. If he could see my face at that moment, he would notice that my brow was furrowed and my lips were pursed. At this rate, I'd get worry lines by forty. But my hand mechanically stroked his scalp, my palm brushing over the soft bristles of his hair as I tried to come to terms with this truth I didn't want to be true.

"I let her..."

"You didn't let her do anything," I said calmly. "Don't be an idiot. You know that. You're a CSI. You should know that no one lets anyone do anything." I closed my eyes, unconsciously holding him tighter. "People come, and they take. Take whatever they want. Money, drugs, sex, advantage... That's what she took, Nicky. Advantage."

I felt his breath dance across my skin and closed my eyes, savoring our closeness, and the silence that encompassed us like a heavy woolen blanket. It kept us warm and protected like a cocoon, and I wished we could stay in that bed like this forever. I didn't want him to speak. I didn't want him to throw off the covers that kept him close. I was worried that if he spoke, it would be to say goodbye, and he would be leaving again. And no attempt of mine would bring him back. Because he was worse than naked in my bed. He was exposed. With his jeans still on.

But it was an inevitability, and as is the frustrating case with inevitabilities, it finally occurred.

"Greg?"

I tensed, my arms constricting possessively. "Mm hm?"

As predicted, I felt him pull away, and I had to let him go. But he didn't go far. He moved just enough to be eyelevel with me again, and those soft orbs were drier than the desert we lived in. "I've slept with a number of women."

"Don't rub it in," I muttered.

"No. I mean..." And to my surprise, he laughed. "I've had sex before, and it's not that it was never intimate or..." He stopped himself, and smiled. I frowned at him curiously, trying to divine what he was trying to say when he moved forward, his soft, sweet lips met mine and he inhaled sharply, pulling me closer and I fell apart. This is all I had ever wanted from the beginning, for him to take control and seize me in his arms like I knew only he could do. We broke apart, but I hungered for more, gasping for air.

"I've never felt this close to another person," he whispered.

"Huh?" I'd lost track of the conversation.

He chuckled, and then moved further away from me, and I was scared he was leaving again. I opened my mouth to protest when he put a finger to my lips and moved back. He must have seen the disappointment in me because he smirked.

"I'll be back!" he assured me. "I want to give you something."

I waited impatiently for him to return, squirming on the bed, wondering what the hell he had gone to retrieve. And then, finally, he came back, holding the jacket that he had dropped on the floor earlier.

"As much as I appreciate the gesture, I already have a jacket," I said. "I want _you_."

But he shook his head, that beautiful smile stretching his lips as he crawled back onto the bed. On his hands and knees beside me, I tugged at his hand and he fell down with a laugh. He pulled something out of the pocket of the jacket. My breath hitched in my throat as I realized what it was.

I felt him take my hand and place the gift against my palm, my thumb closing over it as I brought up my other hand to clutch it, staring at it in awe. "I couldn't..." I breathed reverently, as if he had just handed me something holy.

"Why not?" he asked.

I couldn't speak as elation filled my lungs instead of air. "This is yours... It's Tony's." I looked down and my fingers traced the lettering of the title of Nick's Bible. _The Catcher in the Rye_.

His hands covered mine and he pushed it towards me. "It's yours now."

My eyes drifted upwards to gaze into his. "I love you so much." My voice cracked, but I didn't care. I needed to thank him, to show him what this meant, how this was so much more than anything I had ever received from anyone in the past. So I gave him the only thing I had left, and leaned over, pressing myself as close to him as I could as I clutched his gift to my chest. Our lips crashed together and his arms surrounded me.

He broke away a moment, leaving me to wonder why, when he said, "I don't deserve you," for the second time that night.

"Oh stop it," I said, but I was grinning too. "I mean you're adorable, with this whole thinking I'm too good for you thing, but... just shut up and kiss me, would you?"

And he did, without a single ounce of hesitation, and I knew that maybe he would need me to keep holding his hand as he walked down this road to recovery, but at that moment, beyond everything else, we belonged to each other, and he was unafraid, and I was proud of him.

**THE END**


End file.
